Healthy people use complementary therapies to try to make their immune systems stronger and to make them feel better in general.
People who have diseases or illnesses, such as hepatitis C, use these therapies for the same reasons. They also can use these therapies to help deal with symptoms of the disease or side effects from the medicines that treat the disease.
Many people report positive results from using complementary therapies. In most cases, however, there is not enough research to tell if these treatments really help people with hepatitis C.
Avoid any therapy that promises to cure hepatitis C. Interferon treatment, alone and particularly in combination with ribavirin, is the only treatment that has been proven to cure hepatitis C in some cases. Avoid any therapy that is not available in the United States or costs a lot of money.
The federal government is funding studies on how well some alternative therapies work to treat disease, so keep your eyes open for news about these studies.
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