Until recently, the hepatitis virus was considered the only virus of the genus Hepacivirus. But it turned out that horses, dogs, rodents and bats are also susceptible to this disease. Let's try to figure out how dangerous hepatitis C is for a person, how to detect and treat it, since timely diagnosis of the disease greatly simplifies therapy. In addition, young children are susceptible to the disease, and the sooner it is detected, the greater the chance of a favorable outcome.
What is hepatitis C virus?
When a person is diagnosed with this disease, many questions about hepatitis C immediately begin to torment him: what is it (a photo of the manifestations of the disease), which doctor to seek help from, and so on. Hepatitis or jaundice virus is a particle consisting of genetic material (RNA) in the core, surrounded by an icosahedral protective membrane of a protein and enclosed in a lipid (or fat) membrane of cell origin.
Hepatitis C is one of several viruses that cause severe diffuse liver inflammation . Up to 85% of people who have had an acute form of the disease remain chronically infected for the rest of their lives. Infection most often occurs through the blood (intravenous injections with non-sterile needles, scratches, wounds). The risk of sexually transmitted infections with this virus is considered low, but it does occur.
Causes of hepatitis in adults
Hepatitis C is a disease caused by a virus that infects the liver. The functional responsibilities of the liver include removing harmful chemicals from the body, improving digestion, processing vitamins and nutrients from food, and participating in blood thickening processes in the event of cuts and wounds. Hepatitis C in women poses a great danger to infants, since the newborn can be infected from a sick mother during childbirth. That is why it is important that a woman monitors her health when she is planning a pregnancy.
The jaundice virus in an adult can spread in the following cases:
- When using non-sterile instruments for the introduction of intravenous or intramuscular infections (including narcotic).
- When applying tattoos, piercings, acupuncture procedures with non-sterile needles.
- During unprotected sex with an infected partner, if at this time there is contact through the blood (ulcers, cuts, wounds on the genitals or during menstruation). This method is referred to as unusual infection methods.
- With a blood transfusion procedure.
- During treatment in dental clinics.
When sneezing, coughing, sharing food, sharing cutlery or other casual tactile contact, hepatitis is not transmitted.
Causes of hepatitis in children
Symptoms and treatment of hepatitis C in children are somewhat different from signs of the disease in adults. Pediatric hepatitis spreads in two ways: from mother to fetus (vertical route of infection) and through direct contact with the blood of an infected person (parenteral route of infection). The virus can be transmitted from an infected mother to a newborn during childbirth, the frequency of such cases is about 4-5%. If a similar situation arises, then the woman is offered to have a cesarean section, which slightly reduces the risk of transmission of the hepatitis virus to the newborn. Infection of children in the second way usually occurs with various medical interventions, dental treatment, the introduction of drugs through non-sterile instruments, hemodialysis, blood transfusion and other medical procedures.
In adolescents, as in adults, there is an increased chance of getting hepatitis when using drugs. In addition, the risk of infection in adolescent children increases if you violate the rules of skin hygiene when applying tattoos, piercings and other things. When shaving with general hygiene items through cuts and abrasions on the skin, viruses can also enter the body.
Symptoms of hepatitis in adults
Often, many people with hepatitis C infection do not have the symptoms that are characteristic of the disease. Signs of a chronic infection do not appear until scarring forms on the liver (cirrhosis develops). Moreover, the disease is usually accompanied by general weakness, increased fatigue and has non-specific symptoms even in the absence of cirrhosis.
Signs of the disease, as a rule, appear much later than infection, since the incubation period of hepatitis is from 15 to 150 days. An infected person without symptoms of the disease poses a threat to others, as it acts as a carrier of the virus and can transmit it to other people by the above methods. The main symptoms of the disease include the following:
- loss of appetite;
- malaise, weakness;
- nausea, bouts of vomiting;
diarrhea
- sudden sharp weight loss for no apparent reason;
- yellowing of the skin, sclera of the eyeballs (therefore, the people call the disease jaundice);
- discoloration of urine (to dark brown) and feces (whitish feces).
Symptoms of hepatitis in children
On average, the incubation period of childhood hepatitis can last from 15 days to 6 months. Symptoms of jaundice in children occur in less than 50% of cases and are expressed mainly by yellowing of the skin and eye proteins. The icteric period usually lasts up to 3 weeks. Since hepatitis is characterized by inflammation of the liver, the child has a general intoxication of the body, which is accompanied by nausea, vomiting, diarrhea. The acute form of the disease begins slowly, the symptoms increase gradually, while dyspeptic disorders and asthenovegetative syndrome develop. Symptoms of jaundice in children can be accompanied by fever, headache. Feces become discolored, while urine, on the contrary, acquires a dark brownish tint.
The identified symptoms and treatment of hepatitis C are closely interrelated, because with late diagnosis or the absence of proper treatment in 10-20% of all cases of the disease, the acute form of jaundice becomes chronic. Chronic jaundice, as a rule, is asymptomatic and is usually detected during a random examination of the child, when time is lost and the disease remains with him for life. Such children have increased fatigue, asthenia, extrahepatic symptoms (telangiectasia, capillary).
Diagnostics
Due to the fact that the acute form of hepatitis C is usually asymptomatic, early diagnosis of the disease is very important. With the transition to a chronic form, the chances of detecting an infection decrease, the disease remains undiagnosed, and serious complications such as cirrhosis or liver cancer may develop.
The detection of the virus in the body occurs by determining the level of antibodies in the blood, and then is confirmed by additional tests to determine the viral RNA. The amount of RNA in the blood (an indicator of viral load) does not correlate with the severity of the disease, but can be used to monitor the body's response to treatment. A liver biopsy is used to assess the extent of its damage to the disease (organ cell damage and scarring), the importance of which is important for treatment planning.
Diagnosis is carried out in 2 stages:
- screening for antibodies to the jaundice virus allows you to determine whether a person has been infected with the virus;
- with a positive antibody test, a nucleic acid test is performed for hepatitis C virus RNA to determine the form of the disease (acute or chronic).
After that, with positive tests, the doctor needs to assess the degree of liver damage (fibrosis or cirrhosis). This can be done by biopsy or by various non-invasive tests. In addition, the patient should pass a laboratory test to determine the genotype of the hepatitis C strain. The degree of liver damage and the virus genotype are used to make decisions on the treatment and management of the disease.
Hepatitis C genotypes
In order for the treatment of the disease to be effective, it is important to determine which genotype the virus belongs to. Hepatitis C genotypes are divided into six different species. As a rule, patients are infected with a virus with only one genotype, but each of them is actually a mixture of closely related viruses called quasi-species. They are prone to mutations and become immune to current treatment. This explains the difficulty in treating chronic jaundice.
The following is a list of the different genotypes of chronic hepatitis C:
- Genotype 1a.
- Genotype 1b.
- Genotype 2a, 2b, 2c, 2d.
- Genotype 3a, 3b, 3c, 3d, 3e, 3f.
- Genotype 4a, 4b, 4c, 4d, 4e, 4f, 4g, 4h, 4i, 4j.
- Genotype 5a.
- Genotype 6a.
Hepatitis C genotypes are of great importance to doctors in issuing therapeutic recommendations. For example, genotype 1 is most difficult to treat, and patients with hepatitis with genotype 2 and 3 respond better to therapy using a combination of alpha-interferon and ribavirin. In addition, when using combination therapy, the recommended duration of treatment depends on the genotype.
Hepatitis C treatment
Symptoms and treatment of hepatitis C are closely interrelated, since therapy relies on signs of the disease. Before starting treatment, a thorough examination should be carried out to determine the optimal approach to the patient and his illness. In addition, based on the diagnostic data, the doctor can determine which hepatitis C medicine will be most effective for each specific case. A modern standard in the treatment of jaundice is the combination of antiviral therapy with Interferon and Ribavirin, which are effective against all genotypes of viruses. Unfortunately, Interferon is not widely used in medicine, which has a bad effect on the condition of most patients, and the combination of ribavirin with this drug is perhaps the best cure for hepatitis C to date.
Scientific advances have led to the development of new antiviral drugs for jaundice, which are more effective, safer and more tolerable than existing ones. These are direct-acting antiviral drugs (DAAs), which can not only simplify the treatment of the disease, but also increase the percentage of patients recovering. However, antiviral drugs have serious side effects and often cause the following ailments in patients:
- headache;
- flu-like symptoms;
- nausea;
- fatigue;
- body aches;
- depression;
- skin rashes, allergic reactions.
If the child is diagnosed with hepatitis C, treatment should be aimed at preventing the transition of the acute form of the disease to chronic. The therapy is also mainly complex in nature and includes such combinations as recombinant interferon preparations, parenteral reaferon and viferon rectal suppositories. Treatment regimens are selected for each child individually.
For children from 7 years of age and adolescence, it is possible to prescribe a combination of Interferon and Ribavirin. Inductors (Cycloferon) and immunomodulators (Taktivin) are also prescribed. The duration of treatment for jaundice in children depends on many factors and ranges from 24 to 48 weeks. If hepatitis C is diagnosed, treatment should be accompanied by a diet, maintaining a healthy diet and lifestyle, smoking cessation and alcohol. It is important to stay in bed and avoid taking unnecessary medications.
There are alternative methods of treating jaundice, but resorting to them, you should definitely consult your doctor so as not to harm the body and not aggravate the disease.
Forecasts and Implications
When patients show hepatitis C, how much they can live with is probably one of the most important questions they ask the doctor. It should immediately be said that the forecasts will directly depend on the timeliness of the detection of the disease and the effectiveness of the prescribed therapy. Properly identified symptoms and treatment of hepatitis C, selected correctly is the key to success. Therapy has a good effect on the general condition of the patient, gives a positive dynamics and increases the chances of a favorable outcome of the disease. According to statistics, about 20% of patients who become infected with hepatitis are completely healed, although this does not mean that they are protected against infection in the future. The remaining 80% of patients develop a chronic infection (with the appearance of characteristic symptoms or asymptomatic). These people remain contagious to others for the rest of their lives, as they become carriers of the virus.
When the doctor identifies the patient with hepatitis C (symptoms), treatment, the consequences of the disease - information that should be reported to the patient as soon as possible and in an accessible form. If a person lives with hepatitis C for a number of years, then he usually develops the following complications:
- chronic hepatitis;
- cirrhosis of the liver;
- liver cancer.
Disease prevention
Unfortunately, there is currently no vaccine against jaundice. Patients who have had hepatitis C leave feedback that it is better to prevent the disease than to treat it later. So, to avoid the spread of the disease and other blood-borne diseases, people must comply with the following requirements:
- Avoid sharing personal items and using items that may be contaminated with blood (such as razors, toothbrushes, etc.).
- Ear piercing, piercing, acupuncture procedures, and tattooing in places of dubious sterility and poor hygiene practices should be avoided.
- When visiting a dental clinic or any other healthcare facility, people with hepatitis C virus are required to inform their doctor that they are carriers of the virus. Ignoring this requirement puts many visitors to the dental clinic at risk.
- Any cuts and abrasions should be carefully treated with disinfectant solutions and a waterproof dressing should be applied over them.
- Individuals with multiple sexual partners should use barrier methods of contraception, such as condoms, to limit their risk of contracting hepatitis C virus and other sexually transmitted diseases.
- It is important to carry out preventive measures aimed at safe methods of using tools for injections, injections, tattooing and other things.
It should be understood that hepatitis C virus is not transmitted through daily contact. Shaking hands, kisses and hugs are safe, and in this case there is no need to use special isolation procedures when working with infected patients. Contacts that increase the risk of transmission are necessarily accompanied by blood secretion.