The whole point of taking the interferon with the side effects of fatigue, irritability, etc. is to knock out the virus. That appears to be failing.

I have an appointment with the doctor next Thursday. Normally I take my interferon shot Wednesday night, but I am deferring next weeks’. I suspect we will either suspend or change the treatment. At worst, one extra day between shots makes little difference, so even if treatment is extended, no harm.

The problem is I am at 24 weeks in. The type of Hep C I have, genotype 1, takes 48 weeks of treatment. At 24 weeks, the virus should be undetectable. I just got a copy of my latest lab work, and the virus is not only still detectable, it has gotten significantly higher since last month. This is not good. This means it has failed by normal criterion.

Of course, perhaps there is some vector attributable to being a transplant recipient I am unaware of. I am, after all, not a doctor, just a self motivated medical dilettante. We’ll see.

Maybe I will get a few years before the new liver is consumed by the fire of inflammation.

Maybe some product will come along like Vertex 950 and succeed:

“Many of the current treatment regimens fail and lead to relapse. The treatments are often not well tolerated with patients suffering from severe side effects.

“Vertex has also initiated a Phase IIb trial (PROVE 3) to study the effects of the drug on genotype-1 HCV patients who have not achieved a sustained viral response (SVR) with previous interferon-based treatments.

“If PROVE 3 is successful the treatment could offer hope to those patients that are unresponsive to peg-INF and RBV as there is currently a lack of alternative treatments with very few sufferers achieving a sustained viral load reduction upon retreatment…”

Or maybe I am grasping at straws.

“When one’s mind and senses are attracted to sense objects for enjoyment, the mind becomes agitated. As a result of continually thinking of sense objects, one’s real consciousness almost becomes lost, like the water in a lake that is gradually sucked up by the big grass straws on its bank.”

SB 4.22.30

“Prabhupada: …just like in the river sometimes several straws will meet together. And again they disperse. [break] We get our body and mix together, and again we are dispersed by the waves of time.”

Morning Walk — April 14, 1974, Bombay