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Why Your Family Health History Matters with Acute and Chronic Hep B

National Family Health History Day is November 28th, and it is the perfect time to sit down and talk to your family about health; it gives your loved ones an opportunity to provide the gift of a healthy future! As hepatitis B rarely has any symptoms, many people do not discover that they are infected until a family member is diagnosed or they develop liver damage or liver cancer. 

Approaching the topic and starting the conversation can help to break this cycle of transmission within families, and allow your loved ones to protect themselves. If you need some tips on how to start the discussion on family health, you can check out our blog post here!

Your family’s health history tells a powerful story. It guides us on what behaviors to avoid and actions that we can take to prevent developing certain illnesses or diseases. It can also help inform us on how to best navigate the health system. Do I need to be tested for liver cancer? Is the medication that I’m taking actually dangerous to my health? 

When a family member is living with or has lived with hepatitis B, family health history can become even more critical to creating a healthy future. Hepatitis B is one of the world’s leading causes of liver cancer, so it is extremely important to be aware of your risk! Although hepatitis B is not genetic or hereditary – it is only spread through direct contact with infected blood or through sexual contact –  multiple family members can be infected without knowing. This is because hepatitis B often does not have any symptoms and can be spread from mother to child during childbirth or by sharing sharp objects such as razors, toothbrushes, or body jewelry that may contain small amounts of infected blood. Knowing about a family members’ current or past infection is a signal to get tested for hepatitis B using the 3-panel hepatitis B blood test (HBsAg, HBsAb, HBcAb). Testing is the only way to be sure of your hepatitis B status. The test will let you know if you have a current infection, have recovered for a past infection, or need to be vaccinated. 

Why does this matter if myself or a family member has recovered from a past infection? 

If someone has recovered from a past infection (either acute or chronic), this is great news! Loss of the hepatitis B surface antigen may be exciting, but it does not mean that you don’t need to proceed with caution! Recovery from a past infection means that while the virus is no longer in your blood, it is still living in the liver in an inactive state. You cannot infect anyone else at this stage, but family members, and sexual partners should still get tested for the 3-panel hepatitis B blood test (HBsAg, anti-HBc, anti-HBs) because they may have been exposed in the past. Check out this helpful fact sheet on what it means to have recovered from an acute or chronic infection!

A past infection should be a part of all medical records as well. Various medications and treatments for other conditions, such as cancer or Rheumatoid arthritis have the potential to reactivate the virus that is sleeping in your liver.  Some medications can suppress the immune system, which gives hepatitis B a chance to reawaken and attack the liver. Healthcare providers need to be aware if you had a past infection so that they can monitor you and potentially prescribe medications to prevent the virus from reactivating in your body. 

Not every treatment will cause hepatitis B to reactivate, so it is important to be aware of the ones that carry a risk! Any treatment that suppresses the immune system such as chemotherapy and other cancer therapies, and certain arthritis, Crohn’s disease, Ulcerative colitis, asthma, and psoriasis drugs may pose a risk of hepatitis B reactivation. You can find a list of specific drug names and their risk levels on our website, but you should always consult your doctor or provider for the most accurate information. 

Every medication also comes with a warning label that you should read carefully. This section will let you know if there is a risk of reactivation. You can also use the National Institute of Health’s LiverTox website to search the name of treatment and see if there is a risk!

Talking to Your Family 

Hepatitis B may increase a person’s risk of liver disease and liver cancer but with knowledge of an infection, you can take measures to help manage it. For family members who have not been infected, they can take action to prevent future infection by getting vaccinated! Many people assume that they have already been vaccinated, but this is not always the case. Globally, adult completion rates of all 3 doses of the vaccine are low, meaning that most adults are vulnerable to infection. The vaccine is highly effective and is the best form of protection against the virus. Don’t assume you have been vaccinated; check your immunization records or ask your doctor! 

Spending your holiday talking about health may not sound like fun, but it is extremely important – it may even change your life! Set 30 minutes aside to sit down with your loved ones and talk about any diseases or disease risk factors, that are in your family. Awareness is the key to prevention! 

Sharing Your Story – Your Family’s Story

Sharing Your Story – Your Family’s Story

Image courtesy of Good Free Photos

Thanksgiving is not only a day to eat turkey or remind us to remember what we are thankful for; it is also National Family History Day!!1 This holiday can be used an opportunity for families to discuss and record health problems that run through the family, as this helps us live longer and healthier. 1

There are many chronic diseases that may run through multiple generations of a family. 1 Doctors can predict whether or not you could have a chronic disease just by knowing if your parents, grandparents, and other relatives have had it. 1 That is why knowing your family health history is an important and powerful screening tool.1 You can change unhealthy behaviors, reduce your risk of diseases, and know when you should be screened when you learn about what diseases run through your family. 2

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Hepatitis B is not like other chronic diseases, where if your parents have it, your genes make you more prone to it. Hepatitis B is not genetic. The hepatitis B virus is transmitted through blood and infected body fluids. This can happen through direct blood-to-blood contact, unprotected sex, body piercings or tattooing, intravenous drug use, and as a result of unsafe medical or dental procedures. It can also be transmitted from an hepatitis B positive mother to her baby at birth.

Even though hepatitis B is not genetic, you should still include it in your family health history discussion! The most common method of hepatitis B transmission worldwide is from mother-to-child due to the blood exchange that happens during child birth. Pregnant women who are infected with hepatitis B can transmit the virus to their newborns during delivery. 90% of babies exposed to hepatitis B at birth will become chronically infected with hepatitis B, which increases their risk of serious liver disease later in life. Knowing your family’s hepatitis B history can help you figure out if you and other loved ones should get screened for or vaccinated to protect against hepatitis B.

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Knowing if you have a family history of liver cancer can also be important, since hepatitis B is one of the leading causes of liver cancer. If your family has a history of hepatitis B related liver cancer, then you may have a greater risk of developing liver damage or liver cancer if you have hepatitis B. Be sure to discuss a family history of liver cancer with your liver specialist.

If you need some advice on how to start the conversation about your family health history, read more here. You can also use the US Department of Health & Human Services’s My Family Health Portrait Web tool to help start this dialogue and learn how to share family history information at a future doctor visit.

You don’t need to wait until this Thanksgiving to talk about your family health history. You can talk to your family about your family health history and hepatitis B status RIGHT NOW!

References:

  1. https://www.hhs.gov/programs/prevention-and-wellness/family-health-history/about-family-health-history/index.html
  2. https://www.cdc.gov/genomics/famhistory/famhist_basics.htm

 

 

Family Getting Together for The Holidays? Time to Talk Hepatitis B and Your Family’s Health History

Image courtesy of Apolonia at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
Image courtesy of Apolonia at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

By Christine Kukka

When we have chronic hepatitis B, knowing our family medical history can give us an inside edge to fight this infection.

Hepatitis B is an infection that often runs in families. Knowing how our parents, grandparents and aunts/uncles responded to this liver disease can give us insider information about our own genetic prospects with hepatitis B.

Experts estimate that more than half of us worldwide became infected at birth. Our mothers may have been infected with hepatitis B. Immunization, which can prevent infection if administered within 12 hours of birth, was not available to us as newborns, nor to our mothers or grandmothers.

So if we suspect or know our parents have or had hepatitis B, it’s important to find out if our aunts and uncles or grandparents were also infected and had signs of liver damage. Did anyone get liver cancer or die from liver-related problems? Or, did our relatives live long lives due to strong genes, healthy lifestyle choices, and avoiding smoking and alcohol?

Knowing how our genetic predecessors handled this infection gives clues about:

  • How often we should be screened for liver cancer? We should be screened earlier and more often if we have a family history of cancer.
  • How soon should we start treatment? If our predecessors had liver damage at a young age, perhaps we should start treatment sooner rather than wait and endure long periods of liver damage and high viral loads.
  • How effective are our family’s genes in fighting this infection? Did many family members with hepatitis B have liver damage or cancer, or did they have relatively long and healthy lives?
  • What effect did the hepatitis B virus’ strain or genotype play? Depending on the HBV genotype that infects us, we may have different experiences with hepatitis B. We may we develop the hepatitis B “e” antibody earlier if we have certain HBV genotypes. Knowing our relatives’ health history gives us some insight into this.
  • What effect does gender play? Did women experience liver damage or did it only happen to men? The female hormone estrogen is believed to confer some protection against hepatitis B. It may be that men in your family are at highest risk of liver damage and need more frequent monitoring and earlier treatment.
Image courtesy of jk1991 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
Image courtesy of jk1991 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

There are other factors besides genes that affect a multi-generational experience of hepatitis B. Did our grandparent who developed liver cancer suffer poor nutrition for extended periods in their country of origin that weakened their immune system? Did the uncle who had cirrhosis also smoke, drink or suffer exposure to chemicals at work? Could a grandparent who died of liver disease eat moldy rice or corn that contained aflatoxin, which severely damages the liver?

Taken together, all of these factors give us clues to medical conditions that may run in our families, and this knowledge isn’t limited to just hepatitis B. By identifying family patterns of medical problems such as diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure or breast cancers, healthcare providers can determine if we and our children are at increased risk of a particular condition.

Because knowing your family’s health history is such a powerful tool, the Surgeon General created a free website to help everyone create a portrait of their family’s health at My Family Health Portrait.

After completing the questions, the website creates a personalized “family health tree” that can be saved to a home computer. From there, families may update the information any time. The tool can be shared with other family members, who can add their health information to the portrait. It’s also important to share this portrait with your doctor.

The Surgeon General has declared Thanksgiving to be National Family Health History Day. But whenever your family gathers for a holiday, ask about their medical history. It just might save your life.

Is Your Family Getting Together for the Holidays? Time to Discover Your Medical History

Image courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Image courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

When we have chronic hepatitis B, knowing our family medical history can give us an inside edge to fight this infection.

Hepatitis B is an infection that often runs in families, and knowing how our parents or grandparents handled this liver disease can give us insider information about our own genetic prospects with hepatitis B.

Experts estimate that more than half of us worldwide became infected at birth. Our mothers may have been infected with hepatitis B and immunization, which can prevent infection if administered within 12 hours of birth, was not available to us as newborns, nor to our mothers or grandmothers. Continue reading "Is Your Family Getting Together for the Holidays? Time to Discover Your Medical History"