AIH and PBC in the family ?

Dear finstersmom and many thanks for your message.
You and my wife could take each other's hands, your case is the same.
Just today, my wife finished the withdrawal of prednisolone, hurray, finished it.

When she began with her prenisolonen increased ALT and Phospater to high values.
Now we try to follow her blood count to see if we can come down.
She has been assessed to be in stage 3, late, so now we wait and see what we can do
her. Red meat is cut to a minimum, up vegetables, alcohol down.
I hope for you and your family that I have many good New Year's evenings in the future.

Dear Connie.
You're right, alcohol should be zero, but there is a difference between AIH and PBC.
This does not mean that the PBC´s can drink much, but it is not a total abstinence
thats necessary. A single glass, once a month does not hurt PBC-patients.
But in principle you are right, now there is also something called quality of life. When you are together with
friends, it is sometimes nice to enjoy a single glass of red wine, no hard drinks.

You must have a continued happy New Year.

Connie, I`ll check documentation

Dear nasalady,
You see the dilemma as a patient always is in. The one expert says one thing, another something else.
Then the patient must rely on what one considers to himself the right thing.
My opinion on alcohol and AIH / PBC is:
AIH is a disease of the liver cells. PBC is a disease of the biliary cells.
The liver deals with alcohol in liver cells and residual particles are then sent to the digestive system via the bile and biliary tract.
Therefore, alcohol is harmful to liver cells, whereas biliary cells placed on overtime by ingestion of alcohol. Thus, alcohol indirectly harmful to the PBC patients. This is of course dependent on the volume and hence the duration of load.
So should patients with AIH absolutely not drink alchol, patients who have only PBC can enjoy alcohol a few times and in very small quantities.
The problem is that patients with PBC, sometimes develop AIH. There is usually a period before AIH detected and therefore damage Alcoholen liver cells deep in the already incipient AIH patients.

Is this nonsense or ????

JoAnn, John and others,

I agree that anyone with any kind of liver disease should abstain from alcohol consumption.  I see the logic to an occasional drink with PBC but PBC does still cause cirrhosis and that is damage to the liver...so why risk extra?  If the liver is already stressed with having some degree of cirrhosis, it seems counterintuitive to cause it more strain.  I used to drink regularly with friends and initially it was hard not to drink but I have been without a drop for 3 yrs and it isn't that bad.  Friends understand and I have water with lemon or soda water with lemon or lime (which looks just like a gin and tonic ).  My hepatologist told me I couldn't have any...maybe one day in the future I could have one glass on a special occasion...I think I'd fall on the floor if I had a glass of anything!  Life is fine without it and I save all those calories...so I can have extra chocolate !!!

I hope you are all having a great new year!!

Hi Connie,

As neurotic as I am, the non-alcoholic varieties can contain up to 0.5% alcohol.  I know it's a trivial amount but still not worth it to me.  As far as New Year's went...I had Martinelli's sparkling apple juice in a champagne flute...it's a little darker but it's bubbly and yummy!

Excerpt from the internet:  “Nonalcoholic” beverages still contain some alcohol, because it’s difficult and prohibitively expensive to get every single bit of it out. In order to be called nonalcoholic under federal laws, a beverage can contain up to half a percent of alcohol by volume. (Something with no alcohol at all is called alcohol-free.) So people who are forbidden to drink alcohol, like devout Muslims, can’t partake in so-called nonalcoholic beer and wine. Nor can people under the age of 21, according to the law. It takes about 10 nonalcoholic malt beverages to equal the alcohol in one American-style lager, says George Reisch, a veteran brewer with Anheuser-Busch and the former brewmaster of O’Doul’s.

One last point, about carbonation: When making nonalcoholic sparkling wine, producers do a secondary fermentation just like they do with regular sparkling wine. But the alcohol it produces is less than .5 percent, so the wine is still considered nonalcoholic. As for the carbonation in beer, like in most alcoholic beer, it’s “forced” with a charge of carbon dioxide at the brewery.

Someone who posted under this article suggested this winery for grape juices....alcohol-free: http://www.drapervalleyvineyard.com./

So here's another option!  But again, I usually stick to my water and save calories for junk food!

Hello Everyone,Okay I was taught in health class the reason alcohol plays havoc on our liver is.... The liver cannot process it so it has to work at actually changing the makeup of the chemicals so it can send it off to the body to get disposed of. This new product is alot like formaldehyde....used in embalming. Of course it isnt the actual formaldehyde but a similar product. Hence the old fashioned term..... pickle me in alcohol! This new product we produce is also a carcinogen (sp) which is why there is a higher rate of cancer in heavy drinkers. Now this info is from high school health and science when they were teaching us why not to use drugs and alcohol, dont know if the medical field has changed its way of thinking. So my way of thinking is it does leave the liver and travel around our bodies...... what havoc can it create elsewhere.

I do have a question about something I did though. I wprk with someone who I know drinks way to much and she got really sick one day, when she was going to the local hospital I told her to request a certain Dr. one that I knew would see this issue and address it even though it may have nothing to do with her initial visit. Was I wrong to do this...... even though something happened to make her see her own Dr later and has decided to try to stop drinking. I feel I steered her in the right direction but in a sneaky way! Was that bad of me?

Sue

I am wondering if there are any Canadians reading this who have PBC.

Also for those of you who like me experience an intolerable itching, there is help. There is quite a few drugs that can help. It is just a matter of finding what works for you. I have been put on an antibiotic of all things that is really helping. Also I have founda a product at the body shop, it is a soy cream for sensitive skin that is amazing in our dry winter weather.

Sue,

I think your sneakiness proved beneficial so it's all good!!

Connie, you are truly a strong woman to have gone thru all you have and maintained sobriety through it all.  I'm sure many people (myself included) are very proud of you!