Hepatitis C and Men

by Lucinda Porter, RN on June 17, 2013

MenWalking_zIn honor of Father’s Day, my June HCV Advocate column is titled, Hepatitis C and Men. Here is an excerpt.

In the U.S., men account for two-thirds of the chronic hepatitis C virus infections. Men are more than twice as likely to die from hepatitis C as women are. Approximately 5.4% of U.S. Veterans, particularly from the Vietnam War era, have hepatitis C, tripling that of the general U.S. population. The majority of Veterans with hepatitis C are men.

Hepatitis C and Fatherhood - Although men don’t bear children, they become fathers and grandfathers. Hepatitis C is rarely passed in families, but the presence of children is an opportunity to review hepatitis C transmission and prevention.

One potential risk  associated with fatherhood and hepatitis C occurs during treatment. If pregnancy is a potential issue for your sexual partner(s), be sure that you and your partner use at least two reliable forms of effective contraception during treatment and during the 6-month post-treatment follow-up period.

Hepatitis C and Sex - Sex is fun; hepatitis C is not. Although hepatitis C is rarely passed between long-term monogamous heterosexual partners who are HIV-negative, there are situations in which transmission is risky. Educate yourself about hepatitis C transmission. Practice safer sex, and regularly review safer sex information, even if you think you know everything there is to know about minimizing HCV transmission during sex.

Hepatitis C and Occupational Risks - If you work in an occupation with a risk for blood-to-blood contact, be sure to know what safety precautions are required for your work. Review these regularly, even if you think you know all there is to know about keeping yourself and others safe.

Hepatitis C and Psychosocial Issues - Discussing feelings, symptoms, and side effects are not a sign of weakness; they are information. There are no bad data. Always report thoughts of hurting self or others. Seek medical advice for depression.

Special Populations: Hemophilia, Incarceration and Violence - Know your risk factors. Men are more likely to be exposed to violence, and thus blood. The majority of those who are incarcerated are men. Every year, about 1 in 5,000 males are born with hemophilia. Anyone who received clotting factors before 1987 or a blood transfusion prior to 1992 needs to be tested for hepatitis C. Even if you do not have hepatitis C risk factors, if you wonder if you have a history of exposure based on blood-to-blood contact, it is reasonable to request an HCV test. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends hepatitis C testing for everyone born from 1945 through 1965.

Click here to read the rest of the HCV Advocate article.

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Hepatitis C Lessons from Hindsight

by Lucinda Porter, RN on June 13, 2013

Image courtesy of stockimages/FreeDigitalPhotos.net
We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. ~ E. M. Forster

I have gone through three hepatitis C treatments. Each one felt like a temporary suspension of sanity.  All three times, I thought I was doing really well. I convinced myself and everyone I know that I was feeling pretty good, functioning well, and completely sane.

Unfortunately, I was wrong. The weirdest feature about hepatitis C treatment is that reality is hard to judge. I thought I was fine, but I wasn’t. This was only apparent after finishing the hepatitis C medications, and I had the perspective of hindsight. Looking back, I saw that I was weaker, cloudier, more self-righteous, and over-reactive than I thought I had been.

I believed that my previous experience with treatment would spare me this. After all, insight often leads to change. Nevertheless, I was still quite self-absorbed. Meditation helped; lessons learned from prior treatments also helped. However, in the final analysis, my good intentions were no match for hepatitis C antivirals.

There was one powerful tool that did help—acceptance. When I acted less loving than usual, I tried to be compassionate with myself. In the old days, I’d call myself a jerk. This time I refrained from chastising and labeling myself. I saw that I was a hepatitis C patient, on heavy medications, who deserved patience and loving-kindness. Acceptance prevented me from making a bad situation worse. In hindsight, acceptance was my best tool for managing hepatitis C treatment.

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When Hepatitis C Treatment is Over

June 10, 2013

How much of human life is lost in waiting? ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson My third hepatitis C treatment is over, and everyone wants to know the results. I have none to report. I won’t know the final outcome until around Thanksgiving. For the past couple of weeks, I have been labeling this as a “time of [...]

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Creative Hepatitis C Treatment

June 6, 2013

Creativity is not the finding of a thing, but the making something out of it after it is found. ~ James Russell Lowell In my last blog post, I discussed my concerns about the potential risks of waiting for new hepatitis C treatments. Although I am in favor of waiting, there are those with advanced [...]

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Troubling Concerns about Hepatitis C Treatment

June 3, 2013

The trouble with the future is that is usually arrives before we’re ready for it. ~ Arnold H. Glasow ??? I have been in the hepatitis C field since 1997.  One of the most common questions patients ponder, myself included, is, “Should I treat hepatitis C now or wait?” In 1997, success rates for hepatitis [...]

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More Powerful than Hepatitis C

May 30, 2013

We cannot live only for ourselves.  A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men. ~Herman Melville Hepatitis C is a powerful virus, able to replicate a trillion times a day in the liver. This microscopic organism damages the liver, affects our brains, our moods, and disrupts our lives. However, we are made of more [...]

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Hepatitis C and Military Service

May 27, 2013

Memorial Day is a day set aside to remember the men and women who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces. Memorial Day also falls in the month dedicated to increasing awareness about viral hepatitis C. Since U.S. veterans are at a higher risk for hepatitis C, today’s post focuses on this special group. [...]

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Hepatitis C and Hope

May 23, 2013

The most important word in the English language is hope. ~ Eleanor Roosevelt From time to time, hepatitis C patients who are about to start treatment say, “I don’t want to get my hopes up.  To this I ask, “Why not?” When I was growing up, I was discouraged from having too much hope. “Don’t [...]

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Twelve Things I Won’t Miss Now that Hepatitis C Treatment is Over

May 20, 2013

This week I completed my 3rd hepatitis C treatment. Since I was participating in an interferon-free clinical trial, this course wasn’t too bad. It was also short—only 12 weeks. However, I did have some side effects, prompting me to write a list of twelve things I won’t miss about treatment: Having to take pills, not [...]

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Hepatitis Testing Day

May 16, 2013

Sunday, May 19 is the second national Hepatitis Testing Day. The purpose of this day is to promote screening for people who are at risk for viral hepatitis. Hepatitis Testing Day is also an opportunity to educate the public and to increase awareness about viral hepatitis. Millions of Americans have chronic hepatitis; most of them do not [...]

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