Before thinking about the hepatitis C symptoms, we should be discussing the condition itself. Just as the name suggests, hepatitis C is a type of hepatitis. This refers to the inflammation of the liver that is triggered by different viruses and some other factors, like alcohol abuse.
The symptoms of hepatitis C
When people get infected for the first time, in about 75% of the cases they have no symptoms at all. The rest of the patients say that they experience loss of appetite, fatigue, fever or muscle pain. At the early stages of the infection the skin gets yellow only in rare cases.
With time the patients who have a chronic infection will experience the effects of the inflammation of the liver as the symptoms of hepatitis C because the immune system is trying to fight the infection off.
In case you have a blood test at this stage the doctors may find high levels of liver enzymes.
If this happens as one of the hepatitis C symptoms it means that the liver has been damaged and this may be the first indicator of the infection.
In this case the patients complain of fatigue and they might also have some nonspecific symptoms.
Cirrhosis
In case a cirrhosis appears as one of the symptoms of hepatitis C, then some other symptoms could appear as well, such as weakness, weight loss, loss of appetite, breast enlargement. In case of the male patients the symptoms include rash of the palms, blood clotting problems, and a change of the blood vessels on the surface of the skin.
In the advanced cases the hepatitis C symptoms also include liver failure because of the cirrhosis. Remember that this could endanger the life of the patient. As a result he or she may suffer from confusion or even coma since the liver isn’t able to process toxic substances.
Fluid in the abdominal cavity
As another one of the symptoms of hepatitis C there may be a fluid buildup in the abdomen. This is caused by the pressure on the blood vessels of the liver. The veins of the swallowing tube could also suffer changes, and they might end up having a massive bleeding.
Some other severe hepatitis C symptoms include portal hypertension leading to kidney failure or having the spleen enlarged. All this could cause anemia or the patient could develop low platelets, promoting bleeding.
If the patient is faced with advanced cirrhosis, as it has been mentioned before, the symptoms of hepatitis C include liver failure, and so there will be less clotting agents in the body. Another problem that these patients have to face is developing jaundice.
This is a problem caused by the fact that the liver isn’t able to eliminate the yellow compound that comes from the old red blood cells, known as bilirubin.
As you can see there are many different kinds of hepatitis C symptoms, and while some are hardly noticeable and highly manageable, there are also some that people cannot be prepared for.
