Type2

[Doofus_jones]

Hi People

I have just been diagnosed with HepC type 2b today. I have stage 3 fribrosis and a viral load of 1.3 mill. Problem is I'm 63 years old. I think this has been hanging around from a very brief period of fooling with drugs in the early 70s. Anyone here know anyone my age who has come through a 24 week interferon and ribavirin course OK.? I thought I read somewhere Drs wouldn't give interferon to anyone over 60?

Best wishes to you all

Doofus

[desrt]

Good luck and be sure to post your 4 week viral load test.
Worst case scenario, you still have almost a 30% chance of clearing. If the side effects aren't treating you too badly, you can still do 24 weeks with those odds.
If you're undetectable at 4 weeks you're chances are as good as it gets      >70%.

[orphanedhawk]

You can ignore those 'best answer' emails. That's what I do.
There is rarely one best answer.

[Doofus_jones]

To let you know I started treatment today.

Peg-interferon and riba 800mm. I asked for bigger dose of Riba but Dr said I was average weight and normal does will do. Unfortunately IL28B test showed me as TT but Dr said this has less significance on Type 2.

I keep getting asked by this site to log best advice but I am grateful to ALL! To choose one over another seems to me to devalue folks' good will.

I thank everyone who has kindly responded and will check in.

best wishes and be lucky, for you and me!

Pete

[Doofus_jones]

once again thanks for the valuable info. I will let you know how it goes.

Pete

[Doofus_jones]

thanks for this. I will discuss with Dr Poon - I call him Ferrari Poon - because everytime he see sees me he can afford another Ferrari!  Medicine in HK is very expensive.

best wishes


Pete

[desrt]

"hope your doctor will prescribe the ribavirin dosage according to your weight instead of a standard 800 mg."

This is a good point. I had stats very similar to yours except for being geno 3 rather than 2.
Infected for aprox. 30 years. Worked hard, felt good. Lower fibrosis score, but I found later that I had steatosis (fatty liver) something geno 3s  are prone to.
My doctor started me on weight dosed 1200mg. , though later in tx (week 19) I dropped to 800. My understanding is that riba does its 'heavy lifting' during the early part of tx, so this is a good point to confirm with your doctor.
Good luck.