The Price of Overindulgence: Alcohol and Liver Damage
How does alcohol harm the liver?
Excessive alcohol leads to excessive fatty acid synthesis in the liver, leading to accumulation of excessive fat in liver. Alcohol also leads to oxidative damage in the liver, causing inflammation and cell death.
When the liver is inflamed, fibrosis (scarring of the liver tissue) may occur. If the inflammation continues, the patient may develop liver cirrhosis (hardening of the liver) and liver cancer.
Unfortunately, liver disease is often a silent killer – there are usually no signs or symptoms in the early stages of liver damage. By the time a patient shows symptoms, it is often too late.
Patients with liver damage experience feelings of tiredness, abdominal discomfort, and weight loss. Patients with more serious liver damage will have more serious symptoms like abdominal swelling, leg swelling, mental confusion due to accumulation of toxins in blood, recurrent infection, and even vomiting of blood.
How much is too much?
Risk of liver cirrhosis increases proportionally with daily alcohol consumption. While prevalence of cirrhosis is about 1% in patients drinking 30 – 60g of alcohol a day. The risk increases drastically to 5.7% in those consuming 120g daily.
One can of beer containing 5% alcohol has about 15g of alcohol. Which is equivalent to one glass of red or white wine. (which contains about 12 – 15% of alcohol), or one shot of hard liquor.
In layman terms, the safety limit of daily alcohol consumption is about 2 cans of beer, 2 glasses of wine, or 2 shots of hard liquor.
Women who consume alcohol tend to have a higher risk for alcohol liver damage due to their generally smaller body size and the slower rate at which the female body breaks down alcohol.
Binge drinking is particularly harmful สนใจสมัคร? คลิกที่นี่เพื่อเริ่มต้น as the body is not accustomed to breaking down such large amounts of alcohol at one go. The overload on the liver from binge drinking can be even more harmful than that from consuming alcohol regularly.