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Fatigue – a common symptom among people living with hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection – is associated with liver inflammation and fibrosis, but antiviral therapy that leads to a cure significantly reduces the likelihood of fatigue.
Rasmus Thornhøj of Odense University Hospital in Southern Denmark presented findings from the FAT-HEP study, which looked at fatigue in relation to chronic HCV infection, current or past substance use, opioid substitution therapy (OST), liver inflammation and fibrosis, and sustained response to hepatitis C treatment.
Fatigue is frequently reported by people with chronic hepatitis C and has a detrimental effect on quality of life, though its pathophysiology is not yet fully understood.
“People can’t do the things they normally would, and they may have trouble staying in a job,” Thornhøj said.
Last year the European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) recommended that debilitating fatigue should be among the indications for prioritising hepatitis C treatment.