week 15 of pegintron, PLEASE READ if you are on treatment

[DougV]

Yep, replied yesterday.

Mindy,

Staging is the amount of fibrosis (excess and non-functional connective tissue).  There are two scales but most commonly this is 0 for no fibrosis, to 4 for cirrhosis.

Grade is the amount of inflamation, or swelling if you will, and represents activity level, also confusingly done from 0-4.

Staging does go in order, but grading does not.  Grading can go up and down at any time or stay the same regardless of stage.  It varies according to immune response, diet, exercise, medications, alcohol use, other disease issues, and so on.  Staging generally only goes down if the cause of damage is removed.

The lower the grade the slower the progression of stage, for the most part.  And this is where you can impact disease progression.  A healthy low fat diet with plenty of protein, weight kept down to normal BMI range, exercise, rest, being careful with medication and avoiding it wherever possible, and of course avoiding alcohol and tobacco entirely  (alcohol as it damages the liver and tobacco as it damages the bodies ability to heal) can reduce the inflamation and thus slow or even halt progression of staging.

So no, grade two does not mean you are around the corner from the next stage, but honestly you may or may not ge.  There is also some subjectivity involved.  Give slides of a liver biopsy to three different pathologist and you are likely to get three slightly different stages and/or grades.

Doug

Just for grins, if you need to find a previous post from a member, simply click on their name and select recent posts...

[mindy]

  HI, HAVE A GREAT DAY TO ALL OUR MEMBERS, MISSY AND DOUG, THANK YOU BOTH FOR EXPLAINING
THE GRADE ISSUE, I AM SORRY I AM REPLYING IN CAPS BUT I HAVE TO REMAIN ON THIS LARGE AMOUNT OF KEPPRA
THE SEIZURE MED UNTIL I SEE THE DARN NEOROLOGIST ON 1/30/12  MY VISION IS SO DISTORTED FROM THIS
AMOUNT OF KEPPRA I SEE LIKE I AM LOOKING THRU SERAN WRAP, EVERYTHING IS REALLY BLURRY.  DOUG
YOU ARE RIGHT AND MISSY YOU TOO.  SOMETIMMES IF I COUGH TOO HARD I FEEL MY LIVER POPPING ALMOST
LIKE BEING PREGNANT WITH MY TWINS, OF COURSE MEN WOULD NOT IDENTIFY THE FEELING THAT WAY BUT
OUR LIVERS HAVE BLOOD VESSELS AND IF I COUGH TOO MUCH OR MOVE A CERTAIN WAY OR LIFT SOMETHING HEAVY
EVEN SIT THE WRONG WAY AT AN A.A. MEETING IT POPS AT ANY GIVEN TIME, MY LIVER IS ENLARGED AND AGAIN DOUG
DIFFERENT DOCTORS HAVE STAGED ME AT STAGE 2, 3, THEN MY LIVER DOC HAD ME HAVE ANOTHHER BIOPSY LAST YEAR
BECAUSE THEY HAVE A SPECIAL LIVER PERSON THAT READS THE BIOPSY AND IT WAS STAGED AGAIN AT STAGE 1, I KNOW
MY LIVER IS PROBABLY GRADE 3 BECAUSE I AM ABOUT 50LBS HEAVIER THEN I SHOULD BE SO I AM CONTINUING TO EAT
SMALL AMOUNTS OF HEALTY FOOD.  I ALSO AM FINALLY GOING TO ATTEMPT TO QUIT SMOKING AS WELL AND AM SLOWLY
COMING OFF THE XANAX AS WELL.  MY LIVER NURSE CALLED ME YESTERDAY, EVEN THOUGH THEY HAD GIVEN ME AN INJECTION
OF PROCRIT ON THE DAY I WAS DISCHARGED MY REDS ARE STILL WAY DOWN SO I HAD TO DO 200 CCS OF ARENES FOR RED CELLS
YESTERDAY.  I THANK YOU FOR ANSWERING MY QUESTION, HERE IS THE NEXT ONE, I TOLD MY LIVER NURSE TO SEND ME A NEW
QUEST LAG SHEET TO TEST VIRAL LOAD 6 WEEEKS OFF TX, IT IS IN THE MAIL NOW.  I AM PRAYING PEOPLE WILL HELP
KEEP OUR FELLOWSHIP FINANCIALLY STABLE AND PRAY THAT I CAN CONTRIBUTE SOMETHING TO HELP.  THE QUESTION IS
MY LIVER NURSE TOLD ME THERE ARE OTHER DRUGS IN THE 3RD  STAGE OF CLINICAL TRIALS THAT SHOULD BE APPROVED SOON.
WILL ONE OF YOU TELL WHAT THESE DRUGS ARE CALLED AND WHAT IT INVOLVES, I PRAY WILLY READS THIS BECAUSE HE IS
THE ONE THAT KNOWS ALL THE DETAILS ABOUT THESE THINGS.  LOVE YOU ALL HAVE A GREAT DAY.  MINDYY