Who's at risk for hepatitis C?
Those who should be tested for hepatitis C include:
Anyone who has ever injected illicit drugs (even once) or taken drugs intranasally. (The straws used to inhale cocaine may be a route of transmission.)
Blood transfusion recipients, especially those who received a transfusion before 1992. (Today the risk of hepatitis after a blood transfusion is much less than 1 percent.)
Recipients of an organ transplant prior to 1992.
Those who received clotting factor concentrates before 1987.
Health care workers or others accidentally exposed to the blood of others.
Anyone who undergoes hemodialysis.
Hemophiliacs.
It has also been suggested that people who live with someone with hepatitis C may be at increased risk, but that risk appears to be small.
However, in some patients with hepatitis C, no risk factor for acquisition is found.