Three months ago, I started treatment for acute HCV. This morning, I was informed by my doctor the results of my 12-week labs. He stated that the medication was working, however, the viral load was not reduced by two logs. It went from the 5 million range to 875,000. He indicated that it needed to have dropped into the 50,000 range in order to indicate the conditions were right to be cured. He stated that he did not have a problem if I were to discontinue treatment. I opted to continue treatment and recheck the labs in a month to see if a substantial decrease in the viral load might occur. I may even continue for the full 6 months just for the chance of eradication even though the side effects are quite harsh. What is your opinion on this matter? Would you recommend continuing or discontinuing treatment? Do you still there there is a chance of cure with the numbers I reported to you? Thanks so much.

In ACUTE hepatitis C we don't have a lot of data to know the right answer to your question. However, I think it is reasonable to continue treatment since the data on treatment in the acute setting are very encouraging. I just don't know if you will get the cure.

Dr. McGovern