Aa
hair loss et al
63 yrs old, feel great, dx 10 mo ago, genotype 1a, viral load 9 million. liver bx inflammation 4 on scale of 1 to 15, fibrosis 2 on scale of 1 to 6
am on the fence about starting rx
why can no one tell you how long you have had this? the answer to that question would certainly help me make this decision
does hair loss occur with the rx?
if I've had this 40 yrs and this is where I am if I get another good 10 years, I'll be happy
input please
am on the fence about starting rx
why can no one tell you how long you have had this? the answer to that question would certainly help me make this decision
does hair loss occur with the rx?
if I've had this 40 yrs and this is where I am if I get another good 10 years, I'll be happy
input please
Remember you can always stop treatment, but you may not always have the choice to start treatment.
Good luck on your decision. I know it's hard I've been there, but I can tell you the decision was much harder then the actually treatment is becoming.
Good luck on your decision. I know it's hard I've been there, but I can tell you the decision was much harder then the actually treatment is becoming.
if I've had this 40 yrs and this is where I am if I get another good 10 years, I'll be happy "
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You say that now however as someone mentioned above (I think streamline) ten years can go by in a flash...and in say 7 years if you are a healthy 70 year old(young by today's standards) I wonder if you will be saying...gee I only want another 3 years.
Not to be too personal but i wonder if your spouse ,children grand kids and friends will feel the same way.(and I apologize if there are none of these).
And you say another 10 "good years" you may have that ,you may not as Hector says we may have only 10 more minutes but you also must think about the possibility of progressing to cirrhosis and possibly end stage liver disease. It may not always be good years while going thru this.
I guess my point is with a possible 80 % chance of a cure now it would seem feasible to me to not short yourself by saying I f I could just live till 73 I would be happy..and remember those 10 years may be good or they may be filled with lots of medical complications...and certainly not made on the basis of your hair possibly thinning for a few months..
Always a personal decision tho,,hopfully made with the help of a knowlegable doctor...
Best to you...
Will.
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You say that now however as someone mentioned above (I think streamline) ten years can go by in a flash...and in say 7 years if you are a healthy 70 year old(young by today's standards) I wonder if you will be saying...gee I only want another 3 years.
Not to be too personal but i wonder if your spouse ,children grand kids and friends will feel the same way.(and I apologize if there are none of these).
And you say another 10 "good years" you may have that ,you may not as Hector says we may have only 10 more minutes but you also must think about the possibility of progressing to cirrhosis and possibly end stage liver disease. It may not always be good years while going thru this.
I guess my point is with a possible 80 % chance of a cure now it would seem feasible to me to not short yourself by saying I f I could just live till 73 I would be happy..and remember those 10 years may be good or they may be filled with lots of medical complications...and certainly not made on the basis of your hair possibly thinning for a few months..
Always a personal decision tho,,hopfully made with the help of a knowlegable doctor...
Best to you...
Will.
yes, fibrosis progression is not linear. You could be Stage 1 today and Stage 4 Cirrhosis in a year. Or you could die with it and not have had any problems from it. Wish there was a way to tell. The only thing you can do if you decide not to treat is really take care of your self, watch for any progression and if so, then treat. But, in the mean time, you could develop say a kidney or heart condition, that could prevent you from treating. It is a real personal decision. I know a person who has decided not to treat. He has not had a biopsy in 8 years and is fine with it. He is just living out his life. I am 52, have no idea how long Ive had this, possibly 35 years. Im not going to be any stronger than I am right now. I want it over with. I am on my 12th week and hanging in there. will only have to treat for 24 weeks so im half way there already! I have been loosing some hair but dont need a wig or anything yet. I wish you luck with your decison.
Kate, I am on my 40th week of treatment, and it's doable. It takes getting used to, but I still work, travel and do life- just with less energy.
I started to lose some hair around the 5 month mark. It was scary at first, but ita not gotten worse and I still have a lot of hair. I would say I lost about 30%. Not too bad and I still look great.
Best of luck.
I started to lose some hair around the 5 month mark. It was scary at first, but ita not gotten worse and I still have a lot of hair. I would say I lost about 30%. Not too bad and I still look great.
Best of luck.
Kate, for me at 58, i just wanted to eliminate the virus if i could and be done with it. The tx for me was necessary because i just didn't want to walk around with hepatitis c. And, i didn't want to find in a year or two that i had something else too that would be complicated by the hep c or worsen the hep c.
No one can really predict the course of liver damage.
Things start happening as we age and i thought it best to beat this down if i could before something else happened. I did the 48 wks of inf/riba in 2010 and reached svr in april of this year. I too worried about my hair ahead of time but found it just thinned at around the sixth month through the end of treatment. It was not noticeable and the funny thing is you can feel like you have the flu everyday and look just fine. You can wear a wig and do just fine too. If you keep going it gets easier to do and then you realize you are doing it and you can get through it just fine. If you have trouble just be single minded and keep going. Good luck making a decision.
No one can really predict the course of liver damage.
Things start happening as we age and i thought it best to beat this down if i could before something else happened. I did the 48 wks of inf/riba in 2010 and reached svr in april of this year. I too worried about my hair ahead of time but found it just thinned at around the sixth month through the end of treatment. It was not noticeable and the funny thing is you can feel like you have the flu everyday and look just fine. You can wear a wig and do just fine too. If you keep going it gets easier to do and then you realize you are doing it and you can get through it just fine. If you have trouble just be single minded and keep going. Good luck making a decision.
The reason I decided to treat was two fold, I was offered a study Jan. 2011 and one never knows how this disease might progress, it felt like a time bomb and I wanted to do what I could. I was very lucky to clear right away and after 24 weeks remain UND.
Hair loss is a side effect, but it does grow back, and one can live without it, you cannot live without a liver and I understand suffering from end stage liver disease is not pretty.
If you can treat I would recommend it.
I have never heard of inflammation scale up to 15, I thought it was 1 to 4. anyway, the treatment is doable.... good luck on your decision. I was afraid too, but with the outcome and the new drugs I am very happy on the other side.
Hair loss is a side effect, but it does grow back, and one can live without it, you cannot live without a liver and I understand suffering from end stage liver disease is not pretty.
If you can treat I would recommend it.
I have never heard of inflammation scale up to 15, I thought it was 1 to 4. anyway, the treatment is doable.... good luck on your decision. I was afraid too, but with the outcome and the new drugs I am very happy on the other side.
From what I can make out you believe you have had chronic hepatitis C for 40 years. You are wondering if you will live/"get" another 10 years of life. And you want someone to tell you how long you can live with hepatitis C before you die?
First, no one can predict when someone's "expiration date" is up. You could get killed in a car accident today. Who can predict that? If the biopsy report you stated was recent and accurate and you have had hepatitis for 40 years, your liver disease has progressed slowly during that time. Many people will develop cirrhosis in 20 to 40 years. So you have been lucky so far. Congratulations. But as my broker says "past performance can't guarantee future performance." As we get older progression liver disease progression usually speeds up. Each individual is unique and different. That is why no one can predict what will happen to you.
Yes, hair thinning can be a side effect of the medicine. It isn't like having chemo when you lose all your hair including your eyebrows. About one third of people on HCV therapy develop noticeable hair loss as a side effect of interferon. It grows back after treatment. It is only temporary.
What you might want to do?
You could have the IL28B test. That test will tell you how likely are are to successfully treat your hepatitis C. You could have over an 80% chance of cure since you never treated before. It is possible that you may be able to treat for less then 48 weeks if you respond quickly to the treatment. The results of the test are what you should be focused on as well as educating yourself about hepatitis C and how it can impact your life. So forget about someone in a white coat saying you have 10 years, 3 months, 12 days, 6 hours and 17 minutes to live. It ain't gonna happen. And in reality who would really want to know the day and minute they will die?
Good luck on your decision!
Hector
First, no one can predict when someone's "expiration date" is up. You could get killed in a car accident today. Who can predict that? If the biopsy report you stated was recent and accurate and you have had hepatitis for 40 years, your liver disease has progressed slowly during that time. Many people will develop cirrhosis in 20 to 40 years. So you have been lucky so far. Congratulations. But as my broker says "past performance can't guarantee future performance." As we get older progression liver disease progression usually speeds up. Each individual is unique and different. That is why no one can predict what will happen to you.
Yes, hair thinning can be a side effect of the medicine. It isn't like having chemo when you lose all your hair including your eyebrows. About one third of people on HCV therapy develop noticeable hair loss as a side effect of interferon. It grows back after treatment. It is only temporary.
What you might want to do?
You could have the IL28B test. That test will tell you how likely are are to successfully treat your hepatitis C. You could have over an 80% chance of cure since you never treated before. It is possible that you may be able to treat for less then 48 weeks if you respond quickly to the treatment. The results of the test are what you should be focused on as well as educating yourself about hepatitis C and how it can impact your life. So forget about someone in a white coat saying you have 10 years, 3 months, 12 days, 6 hours and 17 minutes to live. It ain't gonna happen. And in reality who would really want to know the day and minute they will die?
Good luck on your decision!
Hector
Not everyone loses a lot of hair. I was one that did. I'm sitting at my desk right now with a cute wig that I get compliments on everyday. Like streamline says, my hair loss is the least of my worries and there is an easy fix. Also, the stuff grows back. Good luck - don't let something like hair loss be the deciding factor.
We all think if we get another 10 years as we get old, but then 10 years go by and we wish for another 10. Especially if there are family in your life. I don't know your situation but there is a cure now for most. I worried about hair too until I started to take the drugs and now that seems like the least of my worries. So many thing we can do about that, plus we're not growing all this great hair anyway as we get older. Who knows maybe the new cropped that grows will be better then the old crop.
Get a good hep doctor and keep an eye on your liver health. Don't forget there are test we have to pass to be eligible for tx. Such as heart and eye approvals. I don't know how our risk for being denied grows as we get older. Maybe someone else on here does.
Get a good hep doctor and keep an eye on your liver health. Don't forget there are test we have to pass to be eligible for tx. Such as heart and eye approvals. I don't know how our risk for being denied grows as we get older. Maybe someone else on here does.
Hair loss is a side effect of tx, as far as knowing when the virus was contracted I associated it with past at risk behavior. It sounds like your liver is not in to bad of shape but the rate of progression is hard to predict.
Keith
Keith
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