I haven't started to treat yet but just had results from my last HCV RNA-PCR. I understand that VL can jump around a bit, but mine has went from 23,964,000 (10/26/10) to 25,538,000 (04/06/11), an increase of 1,574,000. So, I'm wondering if the VL continues to climb when not treating? Also, my Log10 went from 7.380 to 7.407. Understanding how the VL and Log10 go together is difficult for me. Some of you may know that I'm waiting for my next CT scan to check the lesions which were seen on liver and kidney during biopsy. After the CT I'm hoping to find out if I can treat and when/how/what etc. The CT and results can't come quick enough for me, It's driving me from crazy to nuts! Thanks, Mike
The difference between a viral load of 23,964,000 IU/mL and 25,538,000 IU/mL really doesn't have any clinical significance; in fact, there isn’t much difference between say, one million and ten million in regards to eliminating the virus and neither of those numbers relate to disease severity. Once treatment commences most of that goes away quickly.
Viral load can be viewed in various ways; the term ‘log’ is short for ‘logarithm’, and is just another way of expressing the same number... looking at large numbers using log or exponential format is primarily for the sake of convenience. If you use your ‘log’ example it becomes readily apparent how close the two values compare to each other; log 7.380 and log 7.407 are almost identical.
You have plenty of company in the waiting department, by the way. It’s very frustrating when you first start with all this; later, perhaps you might appreciate that by it’s nature, HCV isn’t an emergency situation... this is usually a good thing.
Good luck with everything--
--Bill