Living Without HepC

If you’ve landed here looking for my online diary of Hepatitis C treatment, click on the links below.

You can read it in two different formats - so choose which you prefer.
1. The original Blog format - written in reverse chronological order (ie - most recent entry at the top of the computer screen)
2. Book format - where the entries are arranged in chronological order

Good news! I have now completed the 48 weeks and successfully cleared the virus. I have achieved SVR as they say in the HepC world – Sustained Viral Response. SVR means the virus is undetectable in my blood each time they test it. The testing procedures are able to detect “down to” less than 20 copies per million. Until the tests are developed to detect down to 0 copies per million no one can be labelled “cured”.

That means there is a less than 1% chance that the virus is still there lurking and hiding. But, hey, there is a 1% chance that anyone walking about in the UK has the virus without knowing it, so I reckon my chances are about the same as anyone else out there.

1. BLOG FORMAT
Click here to read the blog in original format from the beginning…
When you click on the link you will be at the first entry. Read from the bottom of the page to the top and navigate to new pages following the Next Entries < < or > > Previous Entries hyperlinks (in light blue) at the top and bottom of the current page. Then use the Archives to open each months entries, clicking < < Previous Entries and scrolling to the bottom of the page to get to the first entries of the month.

2. BOOK FORMAT
Click on the link below to download .pdf file.

My Hepatitis C Treatment Weeks 1 - 48

You will need Adobe Reader to open .pdf files. (Get a free download copy from Adobe.com)
__________________________________________________________

Someone on the Forum very kindly posted up notice about a webcast presentation on the FibroTest-ActiTest™(BioPredictive). This is a new test which quantifies the level of liver fibrosis and inflammatory liver disease and provides a quantitative measure of disease. In other words an alternative to the Liver Biopsy.

This web cast is taking place on March13th2006 at 15:00 UK Time. You can access this web cast on Monday with the information below.

ACCESS DETAILS:

Conference Name: Lab21Conference call
Date: Monday, Mar 13, 2006 3:00 PM GMT
Direct MeetingAccess: http://livemeeting.com/cc/premconeurope
Information:
—————————————————————————————————————————-

TO JOIN THIS WEBCAST:

1. To be entered directly into your VisionCast Event click on the Direct Access Link above.

2. Alternatively enter the VisionCast site and log into your meeting using the Meeting ID and Password:

VisionCast: www.euvisioncast.com

YourName: (Enter yourname)
MeetingID: Lab21
MeetingPassword: 6024199

Then click ENTER at the bottom of the page.

Testing this out, I clicked on the link and was taken directly and easily into the conference system (although no conference was going on of course).

I’ll be interested to see this on Monday and the organisers are happy for readers of this blog to just sign in and particpate.

Pauline Hennessy, from UK Hepatitis C Resource Centre, Mainliners has emailed me information about the Mentoring Conference. I attended two Conferences in London a few years ago and found them empowering experiences - to be in a large group of people all of whom have HepC was a very strong experience for me just after I was diagnosed. And the discussion workshops were useful. Unfortunately I can’t go to the this year’s conference in Glasgow but I would recommend having a look if you can make it.

ONLY A FEW PLACES LEFT!!!

Please also note that the Chief Medical Officer for Scotland, Dr Harry Burns will be opening the conference.

Pauline can be contacted for further information at
Tel: 0141 353 1308
Fax: 0141 331 2552
Email: PHennessy@mainliners.org.uk

I received notification today from the people who organise the HepC Awareness Campaign that there will be a one day exhibition of the portraits next week:

Local Reading resident, Paul Bosse will be unveiling a unique display of large-scale photographic portraits of people with hepatitis C from across England in Reading’s Broad Street on Wednesday 18th January at 10.00am. The display, which features Paul’s portrait, forms part of the Department of Health’s FaCe It hepatitis C awareness campaign.

Media are invited to a photocall at 10.00am in Broad Street (outside the Oracle shopping centre), where it will be possible to interview Paul Bosse, who is living with the disease, a local hepatitis C expert and professional photographer Michele Martinoli whose images are on display and who herself has lived with the virus.

More information about the NHS Hepatitis C Awareness campaign can be read at their website

I received a Campaign Update bulletin rounding the news from the Nottingham Exhibition – the first leg of the regional tour.

Two local people, Nick Green and Liana Stevens, who are living with hepatitis C were photographed by Michele Martinoli, who has successfully cleared the virus, for the exhibition. Michele travelled up to Nottingham to attend the event and Liana, Nick and Dr Stephen Ryder, Consultant at the Queens Medical Centre, took part in media activity on the day.
In the build up to the exhibition a feature appeared in the Nottingham Evening Post about Nick Green and his experience of living with hepatitis C.
BBC Radio Nottingham also signposted the event on their news bulletins prior to the exhibition.
The exhibition had a very prominent position in Nottingham’s Market Square adjacent to the tram, which has an extremely high footfall.

Apart from the prominent display in the middle of the city, residents of Nottingham and the surrounding areas were hit with messages about hepatitis C throughout the day on 7th July with coverage on every bulletin of East Midlands Today from breakfast until the evening featuring an interview with Nick Green.
On Friday 8th July, Central News ran a feature on the exhibition and Liana Stevens’s personal story about living with hepatitis C on the evening bulletin. The same day, the Evening Post ran a one-page feature on Liana’s story.

82,000 East Midlanders were also targeted through an insert of the FaCe Your Past leaflet in The Nottingham Recorder and over 3,000 leaflets were distributed in the city centre over the course of the exhibition. The Nottingham DAAT also delivered the leaflet to GP surgeries in the area prior to the event.

Calls to the FaCe It information line - 0800 451451 - increased markedly on the first day of the Nottingham exhibition.

All this rounds out the news we heard from Nick when he recently wrote about the day on his blog.

So well done Nick and Liana for fronting the exhibition and doing an excellent job with the press and media and contributing to the success of this event.

The next event will be held in Brighton on 12th and 13th August 2005. Both Carol and I are hoping to attend this event – dependant on the planning details falling into place. I will post up more details about the Exhibition as I receive them.