What is hepatitis C?
It is an infection caused by a virus called the hepatitis C virus that has high affinity for liver tissue. The virus is found in the blood of people with this disease.
This infection affects over 170 million people worldwide, and some estimates indicate that there may be 800 000 infected patients, although many of them do not know.
What are the symptoms of hepatitis C?
Hepatitis may be overlooked, many patients have no symptoms. Often the infection is diagnosed for other reasons, the laboratory abnormalities found in a routine, for example.
In the acute phase only 5% have a typical picture of fatigue, lack of appetite, yellowing of the skin, dark urine, white stools, generalized itching. Others pass the disease like a cold or even without knowing.
Once it has become chronic, the symptoms can take are those of chronic hepatitis (often indistinguishable from other caused by other viruses or for other reasons). In general, patients are tired and may lose their appetite. When the disease is advanced may appear swollen legs and abdomen, abnormal blood clotting with frequent occurrence of bruising or bleeding from the nose or gums. Some males have breast enlargement (gynecomastia) can also increase the parotid glands, or reddish lesions appear on the skin. The skin takes on a yellowish tinge (jaundice), and advanced stages can become darker. Other complications are the occurrence of esophageal varices (dilated veins in the esophagus) that may bleed or hepatic encephalopathy (patients are confused, sleepy and disoriented).
The virus can cause an acute infection that is often asymptomatic. This can become chronic in 50-70% of cases. About 20% of patients progress to cirrhosis within 10 years after infection.
Many cases of hepatitis C are diagnosed in patients without symptoms who do not remember having spent an acute hepatitis. Sometimes the diagnosis is made when patients are donating blood or if carried out routine analysis.
The virus is spread mainly through blood, sex a few times and exceptionally from mother to child. In many cases is unknown mode of transmission.
Tags: bleeding gums, bleeding nose, fatigue, gynecomastia, Hepatitis, Hepatitis C, lack of appetite, parotid glands, symptoms of hepatitis C, Virus Diseases