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The Vicious Cycle of Modern Hepatitis Treatment
More people today will choose natural, herbal and alternative therapies to treat Hepatitis C. Many sufferers want to avoid the horrible side effects of interferon and liver transplants that may not show a complete cure by eliminating the virus. In these later stages the solution is usually a liver transplant.
According to WebMD.com Hepatitis C is the number one cause of liver transplants and kills about 10,000 people a year. Even if the transplant is successful, the virus in their body will infect the new liver while they are simultaneously receiving the interferon treatment. Eventually, time and the virus will ravage the new liver.It is a vicious cycle, especially when you look at the cost.
The following shows that the cost of a liver transplant is well over a half a million dollars. Transplantliving.org shows a breakdown; hospitalization is around $248,000, procurement is over $59,000, the physicianis over $66,000, follow-up and evaluation is over $100,000 and with the immune-suppressants and other related charges the cost totals over $520,000.
Unfortunately most Americans cannot afford this mainly because they do they have insurance to pay for it. And even if they could pay for it, more than half would go bankrupt when they go on the treatment; a vicious cycle; death or life with bankruptcy.
On June 2, 2009, Yahoo.com published an article from Reuters that highlights this tragic fact. In that article “Medical bills underlie 60% of U.S. bankruptcies: study”, 62.1 percent of all bankruptcies in 2007 were caused by medical bills that are past due. Another astonishing fact is “most of these medical debtors were well-educated and owned homes and had middle-class occupations”. One of the researchers in the study said it does not offer the average American much hope for coverage. I begin to wonder if the averageAmerican can get over Hepatitis C using the conventional treatment; get well and not go bankrupt. The chances are very slim. Again it’s a vicious cycle forthe Hepatitis C sufferer in the late stages of the disease.
So let us look at the ideal situation where the Hepatitis C sufferer has insurance, finances and is not in the late stages of the disease. What are their options? The doctors will put them on interferon treatment. Those costs are well over $60,000 even with the minimal treatment; but does this really work? Interferon may not be effective for a long term remission of the disease.
The American Liver Foundationhas shown that “the initial course of treatment is 6 months and in most cases the patients relapse and require retreatment”. What this means is six more months of feeling like you have the flu every day and another $60,000. Many of the studies say that higher doses of interferon are not necessarily effective for eradicating the virus. To make matters worse many patients under the treatment experience “breakthrough”. This occurs in patients who normalized their serum ALT levels in the first few weeks of treatment, but show raised levels occurring shortly thereafter, which means they are essentially having a relapse during the treatment itself.
Is interferon a valid agent of proven efficacy? Is transplantation of the liver really an effective course of action if the chances are nearly certain that the new liver will later get the hepatitis virus from body? The patient is just going to get sick again, it is just a matter of time. Moreover, if you are one of the lucky 3% who are well in the first 4 years after treatment are you able to work? The doctors say you will always have the virus so you could relapse again within a short period oftime. More to the point, could it be that the medical solution to hepatitis by ignoring natural therapies is a sure road to bankruptcy for over 60% ofAmericans, that it will only bring continued treatment and relapse of the Hepatitis C virus?
There are holistic, herbal and alternative therapies that many people have used to recover naturally from Cancer, AIDs and Hepatitis C. Doctors say the risks are too great and there is not enough research to support these therapies. It seems in reality that the risks are too great with their conventional treatment; at best there is little chance of real recovery or survival. Alternative and natural therapy is a choice and chance that many Americans are willing to take wanting to avoid the conventional vicious cycle of Hepatitis treatment.
In Memory of Johnny's Father
This picture was taken in 1997, when I went to my father's 50 Year Medical Reunion and assisted him in all of his activities. A little background on my father...he was born on 9 July 1912 in Muncie, Indiana. He attended local schools and after graduating from Muncie Central High he attended Kenyon College in Ohio, Rollins College in South Florida, and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and became an engineer. Later in his career, he graduated from Tulane Medical School during World War II and as a Naval Reserve officer he taught anatomy at Tulane for the war effort to train more doctors. He was a specialist in Tropical diseases and worked with the Hanson's disease clinic near New Orleans. Due to this interest he was part of the consortium who was working to develop antibiotics such as sulfa and penicillin which would change the treatment of many infections as well as Hanson's disease. It was paramount to the treatment of the war wounded as well.
Going to his reunion and meeting his class mates, I was associating with such medical legends as Drs. Alton Oscher, Leon Meier, Flora Finch, Bob Brown, Michael DeBakey, Dr. Herbert, Dr. F. Marascalco and many others. Dr. Michael de Bakey you may remember is the famous Houston Heart Surgeon who operated on Boris Yelson's heart; which was a very successful operation. Bob Brown is not only an excellent Doctor, but he also was one of the New York Yankee's better baseball players during 1948 and 1949. All are Tulane graduates in my Dad's class or they had Interned with him.
After graduation he worked with Dr. Oscher in the Touro Infirmary and was recognized as intern of the year and later was offered a position in the clinic that Dr. Oscher was starting in New Orleans after the war. Instead my father chose to go to Fort Walton Beach in Northwest Florida and open a general practice as that area had no medical care at the time. This was front-line medicine dealing with all manner of treatment outside his office including house calls. Working with the local Congressman Bob Sikes they established a small hospital and attracted more doctors to the area. He was the doctor of record and call when US presidents came to visit the many armed forces bases in the area. He sat on the Florida medical exam board as well as being the head of the State Board of Health for some time. In the early 1970s he retired from medical practice.
In Memory of Johnny's Mother
This picture was taken in 1955 when my Mom (Eugenia) and I were at our Family Reunion. Eugenia Annie Mae Rudulph Maxon 1917- 1973 was born on the 9th of June 1917 in Selma, Alabama to Burwell Blount Rudulph and his 2nd wife, Caroline Caffey Rudulph. This was his 7th daughter and the first child of Caroline. Three of his daughters and his 1st wife died of scarlet fever during the epidemic that spread across the country.
Eugenia grew up at Cloverdale, the family place in Lowdnes county, near Hayneville Alabama that had been in the family since 1834. She was sent to De Funiak Springs to Palmer High school, a part of the Chataqua Movement at the time. She graduated from Wheaton College in Chicago in June of 1938 with a degree in British Literature. Her classmate and good friend was to become the famous Billy Graham. She married Robert von Purucker Maxon at the First Baptist Church In Montgomery Alabama on 25 June 1938.
For several years in the early 1970's she had been battling different cancers. We were together in London in 1973 and while going through the subway turn-style she hit her right side that released toxins in her liver that took her life very shortly within days. I loved my mother very much, but I must say over and over again I am reminded throughout my whole life of the importance of good liver health.