Alcoholic Liver Disease - Risk Factors

Risk Factors

The risk factors presently known are:

  • Quantity of alcohol taken: consumption of 60–80g per day (about 75–100 ml/day) for 20 years or more in men, or 20g/day (about 25 ml/day) for women significantly increases the risk of hepatitis and fibrosis by 7 to 47%,
  • Pattern of drinking: drinking outside of meal times increases up to 2.7 times the risk of alcoholic liver disease.
  • Gender: females are twice as susceptible to alcohol related liver disease, and may develop alcoholic liver disease with shorter durations and doses of chronic consumption. The lesser amount of alcohol dehydrogenase secreted in the gut, higher proportion of body fat in women, and changes in fat absorption due to the with menstrual cycle may explain this phenomenon.
  • Hepatitis C infection: a concomitant hepatitis C infection significantly accelerates the process of liver injury.
  • Genetic factors: genetic factors predispose both to alcoholism and to alcoholic liver disease. Monozygotic twins are more likely to be alcoholics and to develop liver cirrhosis than dizygotic twins. Polymorphisms in the enzymes involved in the metabolism of alcohol, such as ADH, ALDH, CYP4502E1, mitochondrial dysfunction, and cytokine polymorphism may partly explain this genetic component. However, no specific polymorphisms have currently been firmly linked to alcoholic liver disease.
  • Iron overload (hemochromatosis)
  • Diet: malnutrition, particularly vitamin A and E deficiencies, can worsen alcohol-induced liver damage by preventing regeneration of hepatocytes. This is particularly a concern as alcoholics are usually malnourished because of a poor diet, anorexia, and encephalopathy.

Read more about this topic:  Alcoholic Liver Disease

Famous quotes containing the words risk and/or factors:

    It cannot in the opinion of His Majesty’s Government be classified as slavery in the extreme acceptance of the word without some risk of terminological inexactitude.
    Winston Churchill (1874–1965)

    The economic dependence of woman and her apparently indestructible illusion that marriage will release her from loneliness and work and worry are potent factors in immunizing her from common sense in dealing with men at work.
    Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)