A recent study, involving 2,543 people from four cities in China, has made an important discovery about our health.
It looked at how liver conditions affect our lungs. The researchers used two key tests: spirometry to check lung health and liver ultrasonography to look at the liver.
They focused on two liver conditions: MAFLD and NAFLD. MAFLD stands for Metabolic Associated Fatty Liver Disease, and NAFLD is Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease. The big finding was that people with MAFLD had worse lung function than those with NAFLD.
This was really clear when they measured how much air people could breathe out – that’s what forced vital capacity (FVC) and forced expiratory volume (FEV1) are about.
The most important observation was this: as liver fibrosis (that’s when the liver gets scarred) got worse in people with MAFLD, their lung function also got worse.
This connection was there regardless of their age, whether they were male or female, and if they smoked or not. This shows that MAFLD specifically can really impact how well our lungs work.
This study is a big deal because it tells us we need to look at MAFLD more closely. It’s not just a liver issue; it affects our lungs too.
Understanding this can help doctors and patients. It shows how important it is to diagnose MAFLD early and treat it in a way that considers the whole body, including the lungs.
The findings from this research have been shared in the Journal of Clinical and Translational Hepatology. It’s a significant step in understanding the broader effects of liver diseases like MAFLD on our overall health, especially our lung function.
If you care about liver health, please read studies about a diet that can treat fatty liver disease and obesity, and coffee drinkers may halve their risk of liver cancer.
For more information about liver health, please see recent studies that anti-inflammatory diet could help prevent fatty liver disease, and results showing vitamin D could help prevent non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.
The research findings can be found in the Journal of Clinical and Translational Hepatology.
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