Stage 4 no symptoms?

I'm trying to figure out how I could be at stage 4 liver hepatitis and had no symptoms before being treated (external symptoms).  I'm in my third week of  combination therapy (pegintron, ribavirin) but it seems for it to have been that advanced I would have had symptoms.

But also in 2002 I had general blood tests (not specifically  for hepatitis). I asked my doctor if I had any long term diseases that would have resulted from past drug use (25 years prior) and his point blank response was "you'd be dead by now." How could he have been so wrong and why didn't he send me for hep blood tests?

[Myown]

I'm trying to figure out how I could be at stage 4 liver hepatitis and had no symptoms before being treated (external symptoms).  I'm in my third week of  combination therapy (pegintron, ribavirin) but it seems for it to have been that advanced I would have had symptoms
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Alot of us didn't have any symptoms - thats how this disease got its name - Silent Killer.
As far as your doctor giving you that answer proves how little some PCP's know about this disease.

The good thing is that you are txing and also from what I have read on forum tx can move you back a stage or so.

Wish you the best! Keep us posted.

[nygirl7]

I'm stage 3 and never ever had one symptom.  Was just completely blown away when I found out I had it.  I got it the same way as you around the same time as you. Lots of us did.

Like MyOwn said they don't call it the Silent Killer for no reason.

Try to remember, it's a GOOD THING you found out you have this.  Now, you can treat and do something about it before it's too late.

[burned74]

Your doctor is just plain wrong on the"you'd be dead by now comment" and he may have made a mistake in not getting you hepc blood tests. I probably got my hep c in about the same year and same way as you did and I was stage 2 a couple years ago.
A friend's dad is sure he contacted hepc over 50 years ago from a blood transfusion and he is up in his 80s with no symptoms at all.
If you read the info on some of the informational websites, most people do not have symptoms until they are well into stage 4.

[Forseegood]

My ex-boyfriend, the one I got this from (we both experimented with iv drugs a few times with some friends of his, oh, the stupidity of youth! hated heroin and hadn't done that since, but all it takes is one time)

anyway, my ex-boyfriend went into advanced cirrhosis, with liver cancer, (he's still hanging in there, thank God, and I'm around a stage 1, go figure) and he has been working 12 hour days as a cardiac nurse for years and years, nary a symptom...(I theorize, and a few docs I've talked to think the same thing,  that for whatever reason, his immune response wasn't all that much against the virus, so no symptoms, but that's just my take.)

This is all over the place, you can be in low to no liver damage, and have symptoms, or be in advanced stage liver damage, with no symptoms. I think the virus itself causes symptoms in the body, irrespective of the liver sometimes. There is no rhyme or reason to this disease.

[merryBe]

simply put the liver has no nerves in it...so until inflammation sets in and the expansion begins to press on the rib cage and surrounding nerved tissue....
also, males have more room in abdomen,
as do long waisted people...
so body size shape influence the onset of pain symptoms, as does pain sensitivity itself.

In any case, you are not alone...this bug is the stealth airplane of viruses.
although there may have been other symptoms creeping up on you that you just never thought were connected with more than say over doing it...exaustion is a common early symptom that they attributed to aging that was really this disease.

you may join my club.....and let's start a thread called idiot doctors!!!!!