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Signs and symptoms of Hepatitis A
After being infected with the virus of hepatitis A, it takes 2 to 6 weeks to incubate. This incubation period is usually around 4 weeks, and the time always depends on the viral inoculum. In other words, people who consumed a higher dose of the virus will start displaying symptoms before.
Before displaying any symptom, patients undergo a prodromal stage of the disease. In this stage, they may display a few symptoms: nausea with or without vomiting, low appetite levels, general malaise, headache, fatigue, muscle pain, and sometimes fever. Patients with fever in their prodromal stage do not reach a temperature higher than 39.5 ºC.
In the next phase of the disease, the most important symptoms include fever, jaundice, and hepatomegaly. This is the classic triad of viral hepatitis. However, this does not mean that every patient with the triad has hepatitis. This is the icteric phase of hepatitis A, and patients usually have dark urine as one of the first symptoms. They soon notice pale stools, but this sign is not mandatory. Jaundice is the most common sign, apparent in up to 85% of patients, but the skin’s yellowish coloration is not as likely in infants and children as it is in adults. It is usually accompanied by pruritus in the skin, and abdominal pain is reported by around 40% of patients. Other symptoms of hepatitis A include a skin rash and joint pain, but patients with a previous autoimmune condition such as rheumatoid arthritis should rule out autoimmune hepatitis.
