ignore last post (12 weeks not months), I'm too tired tonight! Getting my strength back (1 week post treatment), but still a ways to go...
Oh- see your point now, 12 month thing is a bit confusing I guess.
Does it matter alagirl? Mari74 appears to have not responded to whatever treatment Mari74 is on. It seems to me, time to have a little break rather than tinker with what is not working (I did a one month break).Whether there are options to retreat with a different dosage, or new drugs is another issue I guess.
Well actually guys, did we ever clarify what treatment Mari was on? Mari, specifically how many weeks of what type of treatment did you do? The others may know already but I didn't see it anywhere. And then after that, from February of '06 or whenever you stopped that tx til now have you done any other treatments?
I had a similar result after mono-therapy (acute stage - only pegasys interferon). I thought, my viral load dropped enormously by 12 weeks, but that is of no consequnce. The way I think of it is a bit like those parabolic/bell curves at school - if you are on the wrong curve, you will never get to zero. Better off stoping, and maybe getting on a better curve in the future, with modified treatment, or one of the proposed drugs in the pipeline. In my case, I was lucky enough that the second round, with combination therapy, took me UND in 4 weeks (pegetron and ribarvirin). I wish you better luck next time.
Just want to add:
723'000 IU/ml = log 5.86
360'000 IU/ml = log 5.56
So you see the difference between your viral load of January 2006 and your baseline viral load at start of treatment is not as great as one would think - only 0.3 log. It is easy to get fooled by the number of hundreds of thousands, that is why it is important to look at viral load in terms of log.
I am so sorry you were declared a non-responder. I will try to explain your test results to you. Don't hesitate to ask additional questions.
Viral loads can be expressed in International Units per milliliter (IU/ml) or in log form. Log form represents the same number as IU/ml but expressed in "10 to the power of ...". An easier way to explain what you need to know about this is:
A viral load decrease of one log equals a decrease of 90%.
A viral load decrease of two logs equals a decrease of 99%.
A viral load decrease of three logs equals a decrease of 99.9%.
It is the decrease of viral load expressed in logs (i e percentage) that is important when it comes to determining the probable success of treatment of hepatitis C.
360'000 IU/ml = log 5.56
79'000 IU/ml = log 4.90
You have had a log drop of 0.66 log. To be a responder you need to have at least a 2 log drop by week 12. Otherwise there is very little chance of the treatment working.
Having at least a 2 log drop by week 12 for genotype 1 patients is a criteria for continuing treatment that most doctors use, to save their patients from a probably pointless struggle.
If your viral load had dropped to 3600 IU/ml like your nurse suggested, that would have been a 2 log drop.
A viral load test is not more precise than that it may vary half a log up or down. This makes it necessary for the difference between two viral load tests to be greater than one log (2 x half-a-log) to show a significant change in viral load. Your 0.66 log drop does not meet this requirement.
Again - I am so sorry for the bad news. Best of luck in the future. This is the right place for any questions you may have. There is much to learn and great support at this forum.