Can hepatitis C be cured? This is a common question. We will understand it in more detail. In that period of time when a person realizes that he is sick with hepatitis, other everyday problems fade into the background. An important task of the patient is a quick recovery and the resumption of a familiar lifestyle. Infection of a person with hepatitis C virus can occur not only if contact with the biological materials of the patient has occurred.
What is the danger?
There are a fairly large number of cases when such a viral infection got into the human body at the time when he visited the dental office, tattoo parlor, manicure room or medical facility. Of course, the main risk group is drug addicts who regularly perform intravenous injections, and often the same company uses the same syringe.
It is reliably known that approximately three percent of the people of our planet are the direct carriers of the virus, which is very dangerous. That’s why every year an urgent question is raised - can hepatitis C be cured?
How does infection happen?
According to experts, group C hepatitis is transmitted only by the parenteral method. During the infection period, a viral infection enters the affected area of the human body, which contains the biological material of the patient with hepatitis.
The main difference between C and group B is that this form of the disease is rarely transmitted through unprotected sexual contact. Statistics say that the chance of contracting hepatitis C sexually, without protection, is about five percent in 10 years of the main number of patients.
Can hepatitis C be cured? We will talk about this below. Many people think that they are infected exclusively by drug addicts. This statement is a big mistake, because there are an incredible number of ways in which this virus can penetrate the human body. It should be noted that the infection can penetrate only with blood. This means that this cannot happen in any other way.
Methods of infection
The main methods of infection through the blood can be classified as:
- Blood transfusion. Despite the fact that now all donated blood is scrupulously checked, there are also cases of transfusion when the doctor makes a mistake and a person is not checked for the presence of a virus in his blood. This rarely happens, but even this one percent of such infections occur. There are some countries where medicine is not developed, and donor blood supplies are insufficient there, so donors are sometimes not checked. Such an attitude there does not even occur due to the negligence and carelessness of doctors, but simply because of the acute need for blood.
- Use by several people of one needle. Such things happen to drug addicts, who often inject with just one syringe, using it several times. This is quite common, so most people who have been diagnosed with hepatitis are drug addicts. In rare cases, it happens differently. Oversight and negligent attitude of doctors is becoming one of the most frequent, and therefore dangerous problems that are everywhere. There are frequent cases in which the nurse or the doctor himself, for some unknown reason, does not change the needle and injects several patients at once with the same syringe. Thus, they carry all possible and impossible viruses and infections. Is it possible to cure hepatitis C completely forever, many are interested.
- Work in hospitals and clinics. Due to the specificity of their own work, almost all medical workers have the opportunity at any time to adopt hepatitis C. Moreover, even before the first symptoms are noticeable, they simply may not even suspect it. And all this time they are the real carriers of the virus. More often, infection occurs at surgeons, dentists, nurses and nurses.
- Sexual intercourse. A chaotic amount of sexual intercourse is assumed here, during which people do not use any contraceptives. And in most cases, this happens with the same alcoholics and drug addicts who cannot remember with whom and where they had sexual intercourse. This can be with people who are serving sentences in prison or in some colonies, as well as with people of non-traditional sexual orientation.
- From mom to baby. This type of infection is extremely rare, except in exceptional cases, when in the last trimester a woman had an acute stage of hepatitis C. It is also worth noting that the infection is not transmitted through milk.
- Non-observance of personal hygiene. There is a certain percentage of cases of infection when the banal rules of personal hygiene are poorly or completely not respected.
- Other methods of infection. Here there is a huge number of possibilities when a person can become infected with the hepatitis C virus. Can this disease be cured with folk remedies? This is a moot point.
If the vast majority of people think that this is a disease of drug addicts, they miss many reasons and do not notice when a direct infection has already occurred. It is important to be very attentive when visiting the clinic (this may be taking tests, injections, droppers, etc.), and meticulously ensure that health workers use only sterile accessories and rubber gloves. In turn, you yourself also need to follow the necessary hygiene rules in order to protect yourself and your loved ones from infection.
Can hepatitis C be cured, consider below.
How to protect yourself from infection?
Specialists in this field suggest that all people regularly undergo preventive actions that can help protect themselves from possible infection with hepatitis C.
Medicine today strongly recommends that security measures be taken for both patients and staff of medical institutions and the service sector:
- use disposable tools when doing medical procedures;
- regular sanitary inspection of tools that are used by masters of manicure, pedicure, tattoo and other beauty parlors is necessary;
- during blood sampling, it is necessary to carry out a pedantic check of biological material, which for some amount of time must be kept in quarantine;
- for every suspected presence of the virus in the blood, it is important to do a second, more thorough analysis.
Risk groups
There is a certain group of people who are most prone to hepatitis C infection:
- those who use drugs, especially injecting drugs;
- people who received a blood transfusion before 1987;
- patients often undergoing hemodialysis;
- those who had a donor organ transplant before 1992;
- people with liver problems, but they are not installed for unknown reasons;
- children born to infected parents;
- frequent visitors to tattoo salons, as well as using the services of unlicensed beauty salons;
- medical staff;
- people who have a promiscuous sex life.
True, it should be noted that if a person is in this risk group, this does not mean that he has a predisposition, because this requires the presence of other factors.
Can hepatitis C (1 genotype) be cured? Let's figure it out.
The main symptoms and signs of the disease
In order to quickly recognize the disease, you must consult a doctor so that he can provide assistance in treatment. You also need to know how this disease manifests itself. It should be noted that from the moment the infection occurred, and until the first symptoms are detected, about a month passes. In the case when a person has strong immunity, this process can last about four or five months.
Basically, hepatitis C is a disease that at the initial stages may not manifest itself at all, and many people learn about their disease by accident when they are tested in a medical facility.
Nevertheless, there are several symptoms, in the presence of which it is necessary to think and visit a specialist for further examination:
- poor appetite;
- weakness;
- chronic fatigue;
- jaundice that occurs with liver damage;
- joint pain
- the appearance of spider veins.
These signs listed above can also be observed during other diseases, so in the case when one's health suddenly changes and its deterioration is noticed, one does not need to take a risk. Therefore, the earlier a disease has been noticed and appropriate treatment started, the chances of recovery and full recovery from the disease increase.
Diagnosis of the disease
If the primary signs of chronic or acute hepatitis C appear, the doctor will conduct a full examination, in which the following procedures will be performed:
- taking a biochemical blood test, where the focus is on such components as bilirubin, alanine aminotransferase and alanine aminotranspeptidase;
- taking blood for the presence of antibodies to the virus;
- taking a blood test to determine the virus in RNA;
- ultrasound of the abdominal cavity;
- liver biopsy in order to detect abnormalities.
What does it mean?
If the studies have shown a positive result, this may imply that:
- the patient has chronic hepatitis C;
- this virus has already been transmitted in the past, while the body has independently overcome it;
- false analysis result.
Can chronic hepatitis C be cured? This form of the disease is considered the most dangerous, because it has the opportunity to go into liver cirrhosis, which, in turn, unfortunately, is not treated.
Hepatitis C Therapy
Many people are interested in the question whether hepatitis C can be cured. There is no definite answer to this question, because here all doctors have their own opinions. Some experts respond with confidence that this is completely possible, it is only important to choose the appropriate treatment and create an individual scheme. Others say that how you do not treat this disease, it is only possible to reach the stage of remission, and then under the influence of undesirable environmental factors, this disease may come back.
But people keep asking if hepatitis C can be completely cured.
No full recovery
There is even an exact treatment regimen, only there are practically no real cases of complete recovery. We know from well-known sources that a vaccine capable of completely curing the virus has not yet been created. And therefore, all the actions of doctors are aimed at the following:
- A decrease in the virus content in the body, namely in the liver. This must be done so that hepatitis does not turn into cirrhosis, which, as is already known, is not treated and in almost all cases leads to death.
- Reduction or removal of inflammation that occurs in the liver.
- A special treatment regimen, as mentioned earlier.
Therapy Feature
Can hepatitis C be cured forever? The main feature of therapy is the use of interferon alpha - a special protein that increases the body's resistance and brings activity to those cells that are responsible for immunity. But interferon is not able to completely kill infected cells, but it can perfectly help eliminate the possibility of infection of others, thereby improving their resistance.
After the introduction of interferon into the human body, symptoms may appear that may resemble the flu:
- increase in body temperature;
- chills;
- muscle aches;
- weakness.
These symptoms will be present for about 12 hours. When this time runs out, the patient will begin to feel better. First of all, such symptoms manifest themselves more clearly in the initial stages of therapy.
Can hepatitis C be completely cured? We will review the reviews at the end of the article.
Exceptions are possible?
In special cases, when the disease is observed in the first stage, interferon can significantly help prevent the further spread of the virus. There are several cases where, as a result of such treatment, after some time the patient is completely cured. Scientists believe that this was influenced by an auxiliary dose of the protective protein, which helped the human immunity. True, if you do not pay attention to these exceptional cases of the successful use of interferon in the treatment of the disease, most often the drug simply does not allow the virus to spread and helps the body protect the liver. Therefore, one should not have too high hopes for interferon.
Can hepatitis C be cured, patients often check with doctors.
Reviews
Reviews confirm that the main goal of therapy is not to miss the treatment of the disease in the chronic stage. Otherwise, most often the liver appears in the affected area, and cirrhosis occurs. According to the comments, there are currently drugs that can help treat this dangerous virus. There are cases when other antiviral drugs are taken together with interferon therapy and ribavirin that improve the functions of the liver and those cells that can resist the virus.
Thus, in this article we examined whether hepatitis C can be completely cured.