Saturday, March 24, 2018

Fatty Liver Disease May Be Easier to Prevent than Treat

In The Media
MedPage Today published on March 22, 2018

NAFLD May Be Easier to Prevent than Treat
by Liz Highleyman
Contributing Writer, MedPage Today
Several new agents in the pipeline for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, but weight loss remains key

Fatty liver disease is typically asymptomatic in its early stages and may go undiagnosed for years or decades. Over time, however, steatosis can result in hepatocyte damage (known as ballooning), and the associated inflammation and fibrosis can interfere with normal liver function and lead to hepatocellular carcinoma. People with NAFLD have a shorter life expectancy compared with the general population, and they often die of cardiovascular disease rather than liver-related causes.

The prevalence of fatty liver disease is increasing along with the epidemic of obesity in the U.S. and worldwide. It is expected to account for a growing proportion of advanced liver disease, liver cancer, and liver transplantation as vaccination reduces the incidence of hepatitis B virus infection and new direct-acting antivirals cure hepatitis C before it can cause serious liver damage.

An estimated 65 million Americans have NAFLD, and nearly 17 million have NASH, Scott Friedman, MD, of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City, said during a press briefing on the topic at the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD) Liver Meeting this past November. He predicted that these numbers could reach 100 million and 27 million, respectively, by 2030.
Continue reading... https://www.medpagetoday.com/reading-room/aga/lower-gi/71924

MDedge News March 20, 2018
Red meat intake linked to NAFLD risk
Publish date: March 20, 2018
By Bianca Nogrady 
Higher dietary intake of red meat and processed meats such as salami may increase the risk of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease and insulin resistance, new research suggests.

In a cross-sectional study, published in the March 20 edition of the Journal of Hepatology, researchers used food-frequency questionnaires to examine red and processed meat consumption in 789 adults aged 40-70 years, including information on cooking methods.
Continue reading... https://www.mdedge.com/gihepnews/article/161339/hepatology/red-meat-intake-linked-nafld-risk

Of Interest
World J Gastroenterology published March 21, 2018
In people with HCV evidence of steatosis is found in close to half of patients who achieve a sustained virologic response after treating with direct-acting antivirals, according to data published Mar 21, 2018 in the online journal World J Gastroenterology.

An overview of the article: This is the first prospective study to assess the prevalence of fatty liver in hepatitis C patients who have achieved a sustained virological response with direct-acting antivirals. The study’s findings that fatty liver is present in 47.5% of these patients and that some steatotic patients have clinically significant fibrosis despite normal liver enzymes should raise awareness of the post-sustained virological response (SVR) prevalence of fatty liver and the importance of post-SVR assessment of steatosis and fibrosis and long-term follow up with these patients.

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