CARE FOR YOUR LIVER

One cannot live without a properly functioning liver. The liver is one of the largest organs in the body and the most exposed to toxins, as the liver works to keep us healthy. It converts food into substances needed for life and growth, it stores glycogen and amino acids, and it performs protein, fat and carbohydrate metabolism. It also produces enzymes and bile that help digest food and neutralise toxins in our body.

Some of the drugs we take are eliminated in the liver, especially the ones that are not capsules.

About 26,000 Americans die each year of cirrhosis of the liver, while another 21,000 Americans are diagnosed with primary liver cancer each year. Liver cirrhosis and cancer are on the rise all over the world and the prevalence is rising in Africa, especially in Nigeria. This is as a result of westernised life-style, diet and environmental toxins.

These conditions affect men slightly more than women.

Liver cirrhosis is a medical condition in which the liver slowly deteriorates and malfunctions due to chronic injury. Scar tissues are formed on the liver, which gradually replaces healthy tissues and result in hardened liver. These scar tissues are irreversible and they block the flow of blood through the liver, preventing the organ from functioning properly.

Liver cirrhosis can lead to liver cancer, which is the growth and spread of abnormal cells in the liver. The cancer can start in the liver (primary liver cancer) or it can spread to the liver from another organ (metabolic or secondary liver cancer.)

Causes of liver cirrhosis, liver cancer

Chronic alcoholism — that is excessive consumption of alcohol, such as taking over four glasses of wine daily, or six bottles of beer weekly.

Others are chronic Hepatitis B & C infections, alcoholic liver disease, autoimmune hepatitis, obstructed bile ducts (when the gall bladder is not flowing properly), exposure to toxins such as alcohol, some drugs and infection (or combination of both).

Inherited illnesses such as alpha-1-antrypsin deficiency, hemochromatosis, Wilson’s disease (excessive copper in the blood), galactosemia, glycogen storage disease; prolonged exposure to environmental toxins such as arsenic, etc., are all causative factors for liver cirrhosis and liver cancer.

During the early stage, many people with cirrhosis/cancer of the liver may not experience any symptoms; however, as the scar tissues replace healthy tissues, the liver functions begin to fall and the person may present with abdominal pain, fatigue, weakness, bleeding from engorged veins in the aesophagus or intestine, easy bruising from vitamin K deficiency, exhaustion, gall stones, diabetes, itchy hands and feet, lack of appetite, loss of interest in sex, nausea, impotence,

portal hypertension, dark, cola-coloured urine, weight loss (especially in liver cancer case), yellowness of the eyes and skin (jaundice), swelling of the abdomen (ascites), bloating, and body itching.

Diagnosis

In addition to personal history and physical examination, various testing methods are used to diagnose and screen for cirrhosis and cancer. They include blood tests (to measure bilirubin levels), CT scan, MR (to show the exact location and extent of the cancer) and ultrasound. Again, laparoscopy is sometimes done.

Liver biopsy

While liver damage in cirrhosis is permanent and irreversible, in liver cancer, treatment can effect a cure if the cancer is diagnosed and treated early, using surgery, chemotherapy, etc.

Treatment is dependent upon the cause and is designed to address any complications.

Complications set in when liver function deteriorates. In some people, complication may be the first signs of the disease.

These include edema and ascites (accumulation of fluids in the legs, abdomen and lungs), portal hypertension, splenomegaly (enlargement of the spleen), gallstones formation (there is no free flow of bile), cancer of the liver, iInsulin resistance and type 2 diabetes, and hepatic encephalopathy (a neuropsychiatric disorder).

Before now, the prognosis of liver cirrhosis/cancer was very poor, and the goal of treatment was to only slow the progression of scar tissue formation and prevent the complications of the disease. But with Mayr medicine combining both alternative medicine and conventional medicine now in Nigeria, the Mart Life Detox Centre — the third Mayr Centre in the world — has successfully managed patients with metastatic liver cancer and alcoholic liver cirrhosis using an advanced technology called Asyra Test to detect and treat liver pathology at its preclinical states; and also to detect food allergies that can affect the liver.