...effective have harm reduction interventions been in reduction of Hepatitis C incidence among Injecting Drug Users in the UK? 1.0 Introduction The prevalence of Hepatitis C (HCV) internationally is largely unknown mainly due to the fact that most individuals have no symptoms in the early stages of the infection. The WHO estimates the figure at 170 million people infected with HCV and it is estimated that approximately 3-4 million people are newly infected each year . Injecting drug users (IDUs) are at greatest risk from HCV through the sharing of injecting paraphernalia. In the UK estimates from the Health Protection Agency (HPA) data has the number of people chronically infected with HCV at 216000 of which 90% are attributable to IDUs with over 40% of the IDU population being HCV antibody positive . Some estimates of numbers with HCV in the UK suggest about 500000 . In 2010, new HCV infections diagnosed in the UK was 10,381 of which there were 7384, 106, 2129, and 312 in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales respectively . There appears to be higher rate of transmission among IDU now than a decade ago; 23% compared to 12% in 2000 Although UK is classified as a low prevalence country for HCV; The HCV poses numerous challenges for public health in terms of potentially preventable mortality and morbidity. According to NICE guidance, it would cost the NHS about £1.6 billion to treat all Hepatitis C patients. The cost therefore of failing to diagnose and treat...
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...PKIDs’ PHR www.pkids.org 1 ADVOCACY ADVOCACY Legal Protections for Children with Viral Hepatitis Updated 2006 Overview In the United States, three federal laws are critical in protecting children with viral hepatitis against discrimination in schools, daycare centers, athletic programs, camps and other areas of daily life. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is the most powerful law safeguarding the rights of children in public and private schools and daycare centers. The law also prevents any organization or business from discriminating against a person because of a real or perceived disability, such as an infectious disease. A second law, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, bars schools, colleges and other organizations receiving federal funding from discriminating against children with disabilities. Section 504 identifies chronic liver disease as a “hidden disability.” Most advocates say hepatitis B and C are disabilities that are protected by ADA and Section 504—even though these chronic liver diseases are relatively asymptomatic in children. A third law, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (commonly called FERPA or the Buckley Amendment) prevents school officials from divulging medical information about a student to anyone beyond essential school personnel. ADA also has provisions that protect student medical records. Many states also have civil rights laws that, similar to ADA, protect people with infectious diseases and other disabilities...
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...Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia is a condition characterized by an accumulation of abnormal lymphocytes (a type of white blood cells), in the blood and bone marrow. Hepatitis C is another type of cancer that will be affecting primarily the liver. There is not a cure for either of these diseases but the chances of survival have improved greatly over the years. Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL) and Hepatitis C (HCV) are both forms of cancer so you cannot treat one without worsening the damage of the other. CLL is a lymphoid malignancy that occurs in a heterogeneous patient population. Lymphoid malignancy is a term used to describe a cancerous tumor that can spread and invades surrounding lymph nodes. CLL is caused by the overproduction of abnormal b lymphocytes. This is in contrast to the term begin, which references conditions are not necessarily invasive and do not spread throughout the body. Heterogeneous can be described as the diversity of nearly anything whether its population, classrooms, or collections. Patients may be risk stratified into low, intermediate, and high-risk categories based on prognostic factors, which may influence the approach to treatments. Differences in cell morphology, immunophenotype, cytogenetics, and molecular characteristics impact the clinical courses of disease and individual patient response. Cell morphology is essential in identifying the shape, structure, form, and size of cells. In cancer, for instance, cell morphology pertains to the shape...
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...❖ Introduction Canadian Red Cross society is a non profit organization which works to improve the lives of the people throughout Canada. They provide help and assistance to millions of people in Canada by providing health service, injury prevention and preparing for disaster. Its soul mission is to execute blood supply, blood products for Canadians. It works for blood safety and security. ❖ Canadian Red Cross In the year 1909 the Canadian red cross society went through a serious tainted blood scandal. Canadian who did blood transfusion were contracted with HIV, and Hepatitis C. More than 1000 Canadian died because of HIV and around 20000 were in contact of Hepatitis C virus. The public trust on Canadian red cross destroyed. The federal government laid down an inquiry commission called Krever commission which was headed by Ontario court justice Krever. The Krever commission submitted a detailed report based on blood scandal and recommendations changes were laid on Canadian red cross and they were made to pay a fine of 4000 dollar. ❖ Stake Holders ▪ Federal Government ▪ Provincial Government ▪ Canadian Red Cross ▪ People who get infected ▪ Physicians ▪ Dr. Pierre Duplesis ❖ CSR Pillar ▪ I think that they violated ethical behaviour as one of the pillar because Canadian red cross failed to do the blood testing and screening ▪ They were negligent in providing remedies and health of the public ❖ New Canadian...
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...Hepatitis is a term that simply means inflammation of the liver. Hepatitis may be caused by a virus or a toxin such as alcohol. There are other viruses that can injury the liver cells they are hepatitis A and hepatitis C viruses, These viruses are not related to each other or to hepatitis B virus and they differ in their structure, also in the way they are spread among individuals, also in the severity of symptoms that they can cause along with the way they are treated. In the United States alone the rates of new infection were the highest among people aged 25to 44 years and lowest among those younger than 15 years of age. This reflects that the major of transmission of hepatitis B is through sexual transmission, illicit drug use, and exposure to infected blood. The good news is that there has been a 75% decrease in newly diagnosed cases of hepatitis B during the past decade. The decrease is attributed to increased vaccination and heightened public awareness of HIV/ AIDS this has resulted in safer sexual practices. When a person first gets hepatitis B this is an ‘acute’ infection. Most people are able to let the virus run its course and this will cure the infection. Then there are some which can not clear the infection this is called ‘chronic hepatitis B this usually life-long. Hepatitis B is spread mainly by exposure to infected blood or body secretion in the infected individual. The virus can be found in semen, vaginal discharge, Breast milk, and saliva. Hepatitis B...
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...rare cases, a biopsy (taking a tiny piece of the liver to be analyzed) of the liver can be recommended. Acute viral hepatitis is generally straightforward to diagnose. Patients who report symptoms of fatigue, nausea, abdominal pain, darkening of the urine, and jaundice (a yellow appearance to the skin, and to the white portion of the eyes), are given a blood test to confirm viral hepatitis. Chronic viral hepatitis B and C, on the other hand, are commonly asymptomatic, or result in mild nonspecific symptoms such as chronic fatigue. Jaundice, for chronic viral hepatitis patients, develops only when the liver is considerably damaged. Thus, these patients can remain undiagnosed for years or even decades. The Situation Prior to Launch Background Prior to 1990: In 1963, a blood test to detect the Hepatitis B virus was developed; similarly, in 1973, an effective screen for Hepatitis A was approved. Still, there were many cases of the Hepatitis virus after 1973, from blood transfusion, that were neither Hepatitis A nor B. It is was believed that most of these negative Hepatitis-A and –B results were, in fact, Hepatitis C. It took a joint effort by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and Chiron to identify the Hepatitis C virus in 1989, and a year later, blood banks began screening its donors for the virus. It is believed that “300,000 Americans contracted hepatitis C through blood transfusions or blood products” prior to 1990. In the 1990s: Pharmaceutical companies began introducing...
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...Hepatitis C in Egypt Summary Cairo, May 2013 Suez Cement Title 1 Background Worldwide, 130–170 million persons are living with chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection , which, if left untreated, can result in cirrhosis and liver cancer. Egypt has the largest burden of HCV infection in the world, with a 10% prevalence of chronic HCV infection among persons aged 15–59 years (*). HCV transmission in Egypt is associated primarily with inadequate infection control during medical and dental care procedures. In response, the Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population (MOHP) in 2001 implemented a program to reduce health-care–associated HCV transmission and in 2008 launched a program to provide care and treatment. Infection control programs implemented in 2001 at MOHP facilities resulted in improvements in infection control practices and a decrease in the annual incidence of HCV infection among dialysis patients from 28% to 6%. Through June 2012, a total of 23 hepatitis treatment facilities had been established in Egypt, providing care and treatment to nearly 190,000 persons with chronic HCV infection. Despite these programs, Egypt continues to face an ongoing hepatitis C epidemic * El-Zanaty F, Way A. Egypt demographic and health survey 2008. Cairo, Egypt: Ministry of Health, El-Zanaty and Associates, and Macro International; 2009. Available at http://www.measuredhs.com/pubs/pdf/fr220/fr220.pdf . Accessed July 18, 2012. Suez Cement 2 Findings Egypt has...
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...“Hepatitis B is a virus that infects the liver; it can be acute or chronic. Having chronic hepatitis B can increase your risk of developing liver failure, liver cancer or cirrhosis — a condition that causes permanent scarring of the liver”. (© 1998-2014 Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research. All rights reserved.) “In the United States, approximately 1.2 million people have chronic Hepatitis B. Unfortunately; many people do not know they are infected. The number of new cases of Hepatitis B has decreased more than 80% over the last 20 years. An estimated 40,000 people now become infected each year”.(http://www.cdc.gov/hepatitis/hbv/pdfs/hepbgeneralfactsheet.pdf) Many experts believe this decline is a result of widespread vaccination of children when the liver cannot remove harmful toxins from the blood, fight infection, also help digest food, store important nutrients and vitamins a person is not capable of living without a liver. Hepatitis B infection may be either short-lived (acute) or long lasting (chronic). Acute hepatitis B infection lasts less than six months. Your immune system likely can clear acute hepatitis B from your body, and you should recover completely within a few months. Most people who acquire hepatitis B as adults have an acute infection, but it can lead to chronic infection. Chronic hepatitis B infection lasts six months or longer. When your immune system can't fight off the acute infection, hepatitis B infection may last a lifetime, possibly...
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...Epidemiology: Hepatitis C in the Veteran Population NUR / 408 July 7, 2014 Deborah Nallo Introduction Hepatitis C (HCV) is highly prevalent within the Veteran population. HCV is a major public health concern because of the debilitating effects associated with the virus. HCV results in increased mortality and morbidity rates resulting from the acute and chronic effects of the virus. The most common transmission of HCV occurs through injection drug use, injuries resulting from needle sticks and the lack of infection control in healthcare facilities. The transmission of HCV can also occur through sexual contact between individuals who have the human immunodeficiency virus, and HCV virus, tattoos that were not professionally done and HCV infected mothers who have transmitted the virus to their newborn babies. The hepatitis C virus is the most common blood-borne virus in the United States. An estimated 3.2 million people in the United States have chronic hepatitis C. Most are unaware of their infection. Each year, about 17,000 Americans become infected with hepatitis C ("Centers for Disease Control and Prevention", n.d.). The veteran population has a higher rate of HCV exposure and infection when compared to the general population. Many of the individuals who are infected with the HCV virus are unaware of their infection and therefore they do not receive the necessary treatment. Individuals with HCV are at increased risk of developing hepatocellular carcinomas and other...
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...HIV/STI global issue Intravenous drug users (IDUs) are at an increased risk for blood-borne infections especially HIV due to sharing of contaminated syringes and needles. In china, an estimated 780,000 people were living in HIV/AIDS by the year 2011 and use of intravenous drug accounted for 28.4% of the reported cases. Syringe and needle exchange programs are aimed at allowing IDUs access sterile injecting equipment and safe disposal of used syringes and needles. The first official needle and syringe exchange program (NSEP) was established in 1983 in Amsterdam and these programs have since been widely established in both developing and developed world. Studies have shown that NSEPs effectively reduce HIV risk behaviors and HIV seroconversion among IDUs (Luo et al, 2015). According to Abdul-Quader et al (2013), out of an estimated global 16 million IDUs approximately 3 million are HIV positive and about 90% are at a great risk of HCV infection. Therefore, NSEPs have been implemented in cities, countries and regions worldwide in an effort to address HCV and HIV infections among the IDUs. Although these programs have shown to be beneficial in reducing factors influencing transmission of the viruses and risky injection behaviors, they have also been associated with negative effects among IDUs. Access to sterile syringes and needles is included by centers for disease control and prevention (CDC) list of evidence based HIV prevention interventions. In 2013, a panel comprising of experts...
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...Sovaldi With hepatitis C drug sales rising since 2014 by generating $5.7 billion in sales according to an earnings report from Gilead Sciences, consumers have pinpointed Sovaldi as source for the affluent growth (Tozzi, pg 1). Sovaldi, manufactured by Gilead Pharmaceuticals, is a revolutionary drug that has alienated itself from its competitors by curing around 90% of patients with Hepatitis C instead of resolving its symptoms, which until now was the only solution. (Mukhergee, pg 3) Although this deserves much praise and merit for a scientific breakthrough, consumers such as insurance companies and state Medicaid programs are raising other issues. This drug is priced at an eye opening $84,000 for a 12-week treatment, or $1,000 per pill, and has successfully cured 9,000 patients suffering from Hepatitis C following this treatment, according to Gilead (CSRP, pg 2). Across the Pacific, the same treatment is being offered to patients in India for 1% of the price sold in the USA. This raises many questions economically and scientifically since there is still ongoing research of its effectiveness; however, the burning question that needs to be addressed today in order to provide my recommendation for Sovaldi is how the benefits outweigh the cost in the long run. An estimated 3.2 million people suffer in the USA from Hepatitis C and that number is still expanding (Sanger-Katz, pg 1). When performing scientific studies, we have learned that in order to evaluate the efficacy of a substance...
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...cirrhosis receive guideline-recommended care, but few important studies indicate significant shortfalls.” Some ways to improve on helping these clients would be to if a client comes in to a hospital with liver cirrhosis there should be a standing order for antibiotics and certain treatments, an example would be most hospitals have standard order sets if a client comes in with a stroke, there should be a standing order set for liver cirrhosis clients as well. Another way to improve to help these clients is to have them referred to the right specialists to help them, for example a gastroenterologist or a hepatologist. Clients who are at risk for developing liver cirrhosis should not drink alcohol, maintain a healthy weight, reduce their risk of hepatitis, and eat a healthy diet. According to ( mayoclinic.org) “ Use over-the-counter medications carefully. Cirrhosis makes it more difficult for your liver to process drugs. For this reason, ask your doctor before taking any medications, including nonprescription drugs. Avoid drugs such as aspirin and ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin IB, others). If you have liver damage, your doctor may recommend you use a lower dose of acetaminophen (Tylenol, others).” Clients should also try to avoid infections as much as possible. The main way to prevent infection is hand washing. Conclusion In conclusion, if a client has liver cirrhosis it can not be cured but it can be monitored and the progress of it can be slowed down. The client need to make lifestyle changes...
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...01/30/14 Hepatitis A In today’s society people go out to restaurants and eat every day, but many people don’t know the dangers of how Hepatitis A really is. The infectious pathogen that causes Hepatitis A can be from stool, water that people have bathed in, storm water, and toilet water can all contain the pathogens that cause Hepatitis A. If someone goes to a restaurant and the cook had used the restroom and forgot to wash his hands, the cook could spread the pathogens that cause Hepatitis A to the customers. The United States sanitation system isn’t as under developed as other countries whose sanitation system is under developed. Seeing outbreaks of Hepatitis A in the United States isn’t as common as it is in other countries. Each year there is about 30,000 t0 50,000 reported outbreaks of people becoming contaminated with the Hepatitis A virus. Nationally the amount of Hepatitis A infections has decreased since the last peak in 1995. Hepatitis was the lowest ever in 2007. Even though Hepatitis A has decreased throughout the years, rates are double among American Indians/ Alaskan Natives and Mexicans as to whites in the United States. In September 2013 there was an estimated one hundred sixty two people that were infected with the Hepatitis A virus. This outbreak reached ten different states in the U.S. This outbreak was caused from ‘Townsend Farms Organic Antioxidant Blend’ pomegranate seeds. It was reported that the case that was reported in Wisconsin...
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...Hepatitis A 1. The infectious disease known as Hepatitis is caused by the infectious agent or pathogen identified as the Hepatitis A virus. There are currently seven known forms of Hepatitis, such as Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C, and so on. Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, and Hepatitis C are the most common with the highest rate of people contracted with the infectious disease. Viral Hepatitis is an international main contributor to liver disease and accounts for high illness and death. In the United States Hepatitis A, HAV for short has reached a massive decline of occurrences since vaccinations became available. The decrease in incidences has nearly hit ninety percent. Though, there are still over twenty five thousand people infected in the United States each year with Hepatitis A. 2. The infectious agent Hepatitis A is transmitted through food and water which is contaminated with human feces. There are people who are at greater risk than others in contracting Hepatitis A, such as those who may handle contaminated food. Hepatitis A can also spread in daycare centers. Children and especially babies still in diapers may get feces on their hands, handle toys or other objects that they may put in their mouths. The daycare staff also puts themselves and the children at higher risk if they are not diligent in washing their own hands after changing a diaper or helping a child use the restroom. There are international regions where Hepatitis A is prevalent, with that said those...
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...Your Liver and Hepatitis. The Liver Facts . One out of every 10 Americans is affected by liver disease. Liver disease is one of the top 10 causes of death in the United States. There are more than100 liver diseases. The good news is we can help prevent the liver diseases and keep it healthy. Overview of the liver. The liver is the second largest organ in the body and is located under the cage on the right side. It weighs about three pounds and is shaped like a football that is flat on one side. The liver performs many functions in the body. It processes what you eat and drink into energy and nutrients that your body can use. The liver also removes harmful substances from your blood. Functions of the liver include: • Filters your blood • Makes proteins, including blood-clotting factors (needed to help you heal) • Stores vitamins, sugars, fats, and other nutrients • Helps regulate hormones • Releases chemicals and nutrients into the body when needed • Makes bile needed for digesting fats Liver damage can lead to swollen, shrunken, hard, or scarred liver tissue. Such livers do not work well, and the person can get very sick, or even die, if the liver stops working altogether. Symptoms of liver disease Acute (When symptoms occur suddenly it is categorized as acute process) Tiredness or weakness Jaundice (yellowing of the eyes and skin) Fever Nausea and vomiting Dark urine or very pale colored...
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