Hepatitis C

Hepatitis C is a liver disease brought on by the hepatitis C virus: the virus can lead to both chronic and acute hepatitis, ranging in severity from a mild illness lasting a few weeks to a serious, life long illness.










The hepatitis C virus is a bloodborne virus and the most common modes of infection are through exposure to small quantities of blood. This may happen through injection drug use, unsafe injection practices, unsafe health care, and the transfusion of unscreened blood and blood products.
Across the world, an estimated 71 million people have chronic hepatitis C infection.
A significant number of those who are chronically affected will acquire cirrhosis or liver cancer.
Approximately 399 000 people die yearly from hepatitis C, normally from cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma.
Antiviral treatments can cure in excess of 95% of persons with hepatitis C infection, in doing so reducing the risk of death from liver cancer and cirrhosis, but access to diagnosis and treatment is low.
There is currently no vaccine for hepatitis C; however research in this field is continuing.

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) causes both chronic and acute infection. Acute HCV infection is ordinarily asymptomatic, and is only very almost never (if ever) associated with life-threatening disease. About 15-- 45% of infected persons automatically clear the virus within 6 months of infection with no treatment.

The remaining 60-- 80% of persons will cultivate chronic HCV infection. Of those with chronic HCV infection, the risk of cirrhosis of the liver is between 15-- 30% within 20 years.

Your liver is your biggest internal organ and your body's workhorse. Among its many jobs are converting food liver fluke into fuel, processing fat from your blood, clearing harmful toxins, and making proteins that help your blood clot. This hard-working, supersized organ is susceptible to a dangerous and often hard-to-diagnose disorder called nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, or NAFLD.

Liver disease - Fatty Liver.

NAFLD is defined as the existence of fat in more than 5% of liver cells. It is the most common liver disease and affects up to 25% of American adults, 60% of whom are men.

The disease raises your risk of heart disease and left untreated, NAFLD also can lead to an inflamed liver, a condition called nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH).







In fact, as many as 40% of people with NAFLD develop NASH. NASH can lead to scarring of the liver; severe scarring, called cirrhosis, increases your risk of liver cancer.
A growing problem.

Consuming too much alcohol can cause fat buildup in the liver, NAFLD affects people who consume little or no alcohol.









Instead, the main perpetrator is excess weight-- which causes extra fat to get stored in the liver-- and is linked to dyslipidemia (abnormally high LDL cholesterol levels, low HDL levels, or both), high blood pressure, and diabetes.













Fatty Liver & Obesity

As the number of overweight people has increased, so too has the prevalence of NAFLD. "Much of this can be attributed to a frequent diet of more processed foods and substantial amounts of carbohydrates, in conjunction with more sedentary lifestyles," says Dr. Kathleen Corey, director of the Fatty Liver Disease Clinic at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital. Still, she adds that some individuals with fatty livers have none of these risk factors, which implies that genes can play a critical role.









Eating healthier



Establishing healthy eating habits isn't as difficult or as restrictive as some people imagine. The important steps are to eat mostly foods derived from plants-- vegetables, fruits, whole grains and legumes (beans, peas, lentils)-- and limit highly processed foods. Start-off on your healthy diet by following the links in this article.