My biopsy was also at a Stage 2, and I had a fairly easy time, treating my Hep C. There-fore, it is my personal opinion that Stage 2 is a very good time to treat.
It gets harder to treat, the more ar along you are, so give that some consideration. Dont panic, because Hep C tends to be fairly slow moving. Just stay calm, and organized, and begin taking the steps you need to take, in order to plan your Treatment.
oh my....
By the looks of your question it would appear that your biopsy has diagnosed your liver fibrosis as Grade 2 as well as Stage 2.when you say:
"grade 2 something 2"
If you look at the table above Hector has provided .what this means is basically you have a "moderate amount of liver scarring " currently
The genotype you have (1a ) has an aprrox.. 70 -80 % cure rate doing one of the two different treatment regimes avail. that idyllic has mentioned to you above with time frames of each
As time goes on the liver damage you have can certainly progress and this would be the reason your doctor is suggesting to quote "attack this and get on treatment"
There are a number of medications being tested in trial currently that look to possibly have even somewhat better cure rates and less side effects,however these may not be on the market for a few years(the projections are y 3-5 yrs.)
Personally ,if I was stage 2 and had approx. 75% chance of being cured within a 6 month treatment therapy I would give this advice from your doctor serious consideration..
Good luck and welcome to the group..
Will
Wow I just read your first post and you have gotten a lot done since you were diagnosed. You might want to hang around and read about the various treatments.
If you decide the treatment route and not to look around for a trial there is one med called Incivek (treat possibly 24 weeks) and another called Boceprevir (treat possibly 28 weeks) You are treatment naive so your doctor was right when he said the cure rate is much much higher.
The side effect profile for these two meds is like night and day so you might want to read about both if you decide to treat within the next few months.
"my liver was grade 2"
The grade is assigned a number based on the degree of inflammation, which is usually scored from 0-4 with 0 being no activity and 3 or 4 considered severe activity. The amount of inflammation is important because inflammation somewhat correlates with the development of fibrosis.
What really matters is the Stage. What stage is your liver disease?
The Stage:
The fibrosis score is also assigned a number from 0-4:
• 0 = no scarring
• 1 = minimal scarring
• 2 = scarring has occurred and extends outside the areas in the liver that contains blood vessels
• 3=bridging fibrosis is spreading and connecting to other areas that contain fibrosis
• 4=cirrhosis or advanced scarring of the liver
"1a"
You have genotype 1a. One of the most common genotypes in the US.
You have a viral load of 13,000,000.
The most important factor for if you need to treat now and your chances of treatment success is the stage of your liver disease. Which isn't clear in your post. Is your stage the same as your grade of 2?
Cheers!
Hector