9 Things You Must Know About Hepatitis B by Brittany Brown

Posted by CPR NashvilleTN at 3:27 pm 0 Comment Print

Hepatitis B is a viral disease that targets the liver. Hepatitis B can be prevented with a vaccination. Hepatitis B is commonly spread through body fluids. The most common way that is spread throughout the United States is sex. Here are 9 interesting facts about Hepatitis B.

1. Hepatitis B is transferred through body fluids. Hepatitis B can be transferred by sex with an infected person, from mother to child during childbirth, and also through infected blood and body fluids. In the United States, Hepatitis B is mostly transferred by sex. The disease can also be transferred by injections by drug users, hospital workers, and also first care responders.
2. Hepatitis B can be prevented through immunization. The vaccination is recommended for newborns and patients up to 18 years of age. It is also recommended that anyone working in healthcare be vaccinated for protection against this disease. The vaccination can protect you for up to 15 years. The vaccination has decreased the number of cases of Hepatitis B in the United States.
3. Chronic Hepatitis B is treated mainly by two oral drugs, tenofovir and entecavir. There is also an injected drug that is usually prescribed by the name of pegylated interferon. These drugs are treatments, not a cure. Small amounts of Hepatitis B may stay in the liver for many years.
4. People who are at risk for Hepatitis B are: people with multiple sex partners, homosexual beings, living with an infected person, having sex with an infected person, people who travel to countries with high rate of the disease, and many more.
5. If you have had Hepatitis B and recovered from the disease you cannot get Hepatitis B again. Once your body gets rid of the virus, your body creates antibodies that will protect you from getting the disease again. Some people never get rid of virus so they have the disease for life.
6. Adults develop symptoms for Hepatitis B, but most children under the age of 5 show no signs of the disease. Some symptoms of the disease include: fever, fatigue, nausea, loss of appetite, vomiting, dark urine, and jaundice. After being infected by Hepatitis B, the symptoms could take up to 3 months to appear.
7. Chronic Hepatitis B can be dangerous. It can cause liver failure, liver damage, liver cancer, and death. This deadly disease has taken 2,000-4,000 lives every year from Hepatitis B related liver disease.
8. Babies with a mom that is infected with Hepatitis B can be protected with the appropriate shots. The baby should be injected with the Hepatitis B immune globulin and the first dose of Hepatitis B within the first 12 hours after birth. Over the next 1-15 months two or three more shots of the vaccine are needed to protect them from the disease.
9. Patients with Hepatitis B should stay away from alcohol to protect their liver. They should also talk with their doctor about taking certain prescription pills or over the counter medications that could potentially harm the liver any further.

In conclusion, Hepatitis B can be a very serious disease. Anyone who can get vaccinated should take the opportunity to protect themselves. If you find out you are infected with this disease you should get treated right away. To protect you even further make sure you have protected sex, do no reuse syringes, and do not come into direct contact with others’ body fluids while working in the healthcare industry.

References

http://www.cdc.gov/hepatitis/b/

http://hepb.org/index.html

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