alcoholic liver cirrhosis

There are gender-specific variations in the epidemiology and clinical course of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. However, few long-term longitudinal studies have examined trends in the incidence and prevalence of serious liver complications among women compared with men with HCV infection. We used the Veterans Administration Corporate Data Warehouse to identify all veterans with positive HCV viraemia from January 2000 to December 2013. We calculated gender-specific annual incidence and prevalence rates of cirrhosis, decompensated cirrhosis and hepatocellular cancer (HCC) adjusting for age, diabetes, HIV and alcohol use...

Alcohol consumption is a common custom worldwide, and the toxic effects of alcohol on several target organs are well-understood. Given the poor prognosis of treating clinically-relevant alcoholic liver disease (ALD) (i.e., alcoholic hepatitis (AH) and cirrhosis), additional research is required to develop more effective therapies. While the stages of ALD have been well-characterized, targeted therapies to prevent or reverse this process in humans are still needed. Better understanding of risk factors and mechanisms underlying disease progression can lead to the development of rational therapies to prevent or reverse ALD in the clinic...

Cancer from the gastrointestinal tract and its associated excretory organs will occur in over 300,000 Americans in 2017, with colorectal cancer responsible for over forty percent of that burden; there will be over 150,000 deaths from this group of cancers in the same time period. Disparities among subgroups related to these cancers' incidence and mortality exist. The epidemiology and risk factors associated with each cancer bear out differences for racial groups in the United States. Esophageal adenocarcinoma is more frequent in Non-Hispanic Whites, whereas esophageal squamous cell carcinoma with risk factors of tobacco and alcohol is more frequent among Blacks...

BACKGROUND: Although hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) usually develops in cirrhotic livers, a minority of cases occur in noncirrhotic livers (NCLs). We investigated etiology, clinicopathological features, and occult hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection (OBI) in patients with NCL HCC in an HBV-endemic area. METHODS: A total of 710 patients who underwent resection or transplantation for HCC at the National Cancer Center (NCC), Korea, were enrolled. HCC and fibrosis stage were diagnosed pathologically...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is highly common in the general population, but identifying patients with increased risk for mortality and liver-specific morbidity remains a challenge. Non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) is thought to enhance this risk; therefore, resolution of NASH is a major endpoint in current pharmacologic studies. METHODS: We conducted a retrospective cohort study of 646 biopsy-proven NAFLD patients. Each case was matched for age, sex and municipality to ten controls...

Non-invasive diagnosis and quantification of liver steatosis is important to overcome limits of liver biopsy, in order to follow up patients during their therapy and to establish a reference standard that can be used in clinical trials and longitudinal studies. Imaging offers several methods in this setting: ultrasound, which is the cheapest technique and easy to perform; magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), which reflects the real content of triglycerides in a specific volume; and proton density fat fraction (PDFF) magnetic resonance, which is a simple method that reflects the distribution of the fat in the whole liver...

Given recent profound improvements in the effectiveness of antiviral treatment for chronic Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, we aimed to describe the characteristics of patients referred to hepatology expert centres in France from 2000 to 2007 and from 2010 to 2014, and to identify factors associated with severe liver disease at their first visit for evaluation. We analysed data from two sources covering all of France: the former hepatitis C surveillance network, which included patients between 2000 and 2007, and the ANRS CO22 HEPATHER multi-centre cohort, which included patients between 2012 and 2014...

BACKGROUND: Chronic alcohol abuse, a major risk factor for such diseases as hepatitis and cirrhosis, impairs hepatic alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH, key ethanol metabolizing enzyme). Therefore, differentially altered hepatic and plasma proteomes were identified in chronic ethanol feeding model of hepatic ADH-deficient (ADH(-) ) deer mice to understand the metabolic basis of alcoholic liver disease (ALD). METHODS: ADH(-) deer mice were fed 3.5g% ethanol via Lieber-DeCarli liquid diet daily for three months, and histology of the liver assessed...

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is the most common cause of chronic liver disease worldwide. Up to one third of individuals with NAFLD will develop non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), which is associated with progression to cirrhosis and is rapidly becoming the leading indication for liver transplantation. Sarcopenia is defined as a progressive and generalized loss of skeletal muscle mass, strength and function. It is seen in up to 60% of patients with end-stage liver disease and portends a poor prognosis...

OBJECTIVES: To elucidate the genetic variability between heavy drinkers with and without alcoholic hepatitis (AH). MATERIALS AND METHODS: An exploratory genome-wide association study (GWAS; NCT02172898) was conducted comparing 90 AH cases with 93 heavy drinking matched controls without liver disease in order to identify variants or genes associated with risk for AH. Individuals were genotyped using the multi-ethnic genotyping array, after which the data underwent conventional quality control...

OBJECTIVES: Excessive consumption of added sugars in the human diet has been associated with obesity, type 2 diabetes (T2D), coronary heart disease (CHD) and other elements of the metabolic syndrome. Recent studies have shown that non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is a critical pathway to metabolic syndrome. This model assesses the health and economic benefits of interventions aimed at reducing intake of added sugars. METHODS: Using data from US National Health Surveys and current literature, we simulated an open cohort, for the period 2015-2035...

Alcoholic liver disease encompasses the progressive stages of liver dysfunction that culminates in alcoholic cirrhosis(AC) and in severe cases alcoholic hepatitis (AH). Currently, prognostic scores have limited specificity and sensitivity. Plasma keratin-18 (K18) levels are elevated during liver disease and may be biomarkers of outcome. The objective of this study was to determine if total K18 (M65) or caspase-cleaved K18 (M30) levels were different between AC and AH patients. M65 and M30 levels were measured in plasma of consented healthy controls, and patients with AC and AH...

INTRODUCTION: Despite of some new treatment possibilities the improvement in survival rate for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients is still poor due to late diagnosis. The aim of this study was to investigate diagnostic sensitivity and specificity of Protein induced by vitamin K absence or antagonist-II (PIVKAII), Glypican-3 (GP3), Cystatin B (CSTB), Squamous cell carcinoma antigen 1 (SCCA1) and Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) as potential tumour markers for HCC in patients with alcoholic liver cirrhosis (ALC) using imaging techniques (MSCT and MRI) as reference standards...

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is a common chronic liver disease closely associated with obesity, hyperlipidemia, and diabetes. It can gradually progress to liver cirrhosis or even hepatocellular carcinoma; however, there are still no specific therapeutic agents for this disease. Liraglutide is a human glucagon-like peptide-1 analogue and has a marked effect in the treatment of type 2 diabetes. At present, many studies indicate that liraglutide also has a certain therapeutic effect on non-alcoholic fatty liver disease during the treatment of type 2 diabetes, but its mechanism of action remains unknown...

Only a small number of people may develop severe alcoholic liver disease after continuous or excessive drinking, which is different from the harm caused by smoking, and some people may even develop alcoholic liver disease associated with inflammation, liver cirrhosis, or primary liver cancer. There are complex risk factors for liver injury in these people; besides ethnic and genetic factors, drinking volume, and drinking duration, more important factors are involved in the pathophysiological changes of the liver, such as the type and quality of alcohol, drinking pattern, socioeconomic status, and government public policy, which may be the determining factors for the development of alcoholic liver disease...

Calcineurin inhibitors remain an integral component of immunosuppressive therapy regimens following solid organ transplantation. Although nephrotoxicity associated with these agents is well documented, type IV renal tubular acidosis is a rare and potentially underreported complication following liver transplantation. Hepatologists must be able to recognize this adverse effect as it can lead to fatal hyperkalemia. We describe a case of tacrolimus-induced hyperkalemic type IV renal tubular acidosis in a patient following an orthotopic liver transplant for alcoholic cirrhosis...

Red blood cell distribution width (RDW) is a simple, inexpensive, routinely measured and automatically reported blood test parameter, which reflects the degree of anisocytosis of red blood cells in peripheral blood. RDW was found to be associated with and retain clinical significance for assessing disease severity and outcomes in a number of hematological and solid malignancies. Motley of interacting clinical and biochemical factors have an impact on the red cell population biology. Malignancies per se can act as a causative factor, or anisocytosis may develop as a result of chronic inflammation...

Chronic cholestatic liver diseases such as primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) and primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) are associated with active hepatic fibrogenesis, and, ultimately, to the development of cirrhosis. However, the precise relationship between cholestasis, in its broad meaning, and liver tissue fibrosis is still poorly defined. Fibrogenesis is currently viewed as a dynamic process that appears strictly related to the extent and duration of parenchymal injury. This relationship is clearly evident in the presence of reiterative hepatocellular necrosis due to viral infection or alcohol abuse...

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) consists of an excessive depositing of fat in the liver, which can end up by causing inflammation, fibrosis and also cirrhosis with the corresponding complications including liver cancer. NAFLD has become the most common liver disease worldwide. The incidence has increased in parallel with the obesity, diabetes and metabolic syndrome epidemic, thus resulting in becoming one of the main indications for liver transplant. The diagnosis has principally been through histology but with the development of non-invasive methods, these have helped in simplifying the management of these patients in clinical practice...

Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD) is a complex spectrum of diseases ranging from simple steatosis to Non-Alcoholic Steatohepatitis (NASH) with fibrosis, which can progress to cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. The pathogenesis of NAFLD is complex, involving crosstalk between multiple organs, cell-types, and environmental and genetic factors. Dysfunction of the adipose tissue plays a central role in NAFLD progression. Here, we analysed transcriptomics data obtained from the Visceral Adipose Tissue (VAT) of NAFLD patients to understand how the VAT metabolism is altered at the genome scale and co-regulated with other cellular processes during the progression from obesity to NASH with fibrosis...