Medical Keywords - Everything you need to know about health.

Hepatitis C and Alcohol Abuse

The Hepatitis C virus is an infection that assaults a person's liver causing damage that worsens over a ten to forty year period before the liver, no longer able to continue its fight, becomes seriously damaged. This liver damage is called cirrhosis. This liver damage, the scarring of cirrhosis, can also be caused by alcohol abuse over an extended period of time. Many alcoholics suffer this end result of their drinking abuse, walking around with a badly damaged liver that can no longer suffer the drinking and will eventually result in end stage liver disease and death. These two separate problems often find themselves at odds when Hepatitis C is discovered.

If you have been diagnosed with Hepatitis C you have no choice but to stop drinking alcohol. Don't try to tell yourself that a bit won't hurt, if you're a serious drinker you don't know the meaning of the phrase a little bit. Alcohol seriously impedes the liver's ability to heal itself. If you continue drinking once the hepatitis has been discovered you will continue to lower your body's immune system and so make it even harder to fight the infection. Alcohol encourages the infection to multiply easier and so grow stronger in your body; it also makes the body less able to benefit from whichever drug therapy your health care provider has chosen for you. Alcohol also encourages the liver to store fat and ups the levels of iron. None of these are good for someone suffering from the Hepatitis C virus.

Do not think that you can fool your health care provider by not mentioning that you have a drinking problem. It will not take much for them to recognize this issue. Some physicians will refuse to prescribe treatment for the Hepatitis C if their patient does not stop drinking. They feel that the efforts will only be wasted if their patient is not willing to quit drinking.

If someone is a heavy drinker, with a liver that is suffering from this abuse, over time the liver will not be able to deal with the alcohol and so instead of being absorbed and treated through the liver it will go to other organs. These others will not able to deal with the alcohol, as it is not their function in the body. This can result in high blood pressure, vitamin deficiencies and depression. Not to mention the continued liver damage.

So, if you are told that on top of a serious drinking problem, one that has already started to damage your liver, that you have Hepatitis C perhaps it is a signal that will change your life and give you the opportunity to make your remaining years better ones. Otherwise the two problems together will lead to liver dysfunction and bring you closer to end stage liver disease. At that point the only thing that can be done is a liver transplant and no doctor will recommend a patient who is an alcoholic as a transplant recipient.