The liver is bruised because of fatty liver disease
NHK (residing in Hanoi) has been obese since childhood. Since childhood, she has not been able to eat enough and is always twice as heavy as her peers. As an adult, K. grew to 100kg. When K. was 18 years old, her parents sent her to study abroad, and her weight gradually increased.
At the end of 2023, K. returned home and was taken to the hospital by his family for examination to treat obesity. K.’s BMI is up to 50 (130kg). With an elastic ultrasound, the doctor discovered that K had severe fatty liver with many metabolic disorders.
When operating on the patient, Associate Professor Nguyen Anh Tuan – Head of the Department of Digestive Surgery, Central Military Hospital 108 (Hanoi) was surprised when the girl’s liver was bruised and fatty. Normal people have a red, smooth, and elastic liver.
The doctor advised K. to lose weight urgently because his fatty liver condition was getting worse, causing fibrosis and not recovering cells. To solve this situation, the young girl decided to surgically lose weight using gastric sleeve reduction endoscopy.
Doctor Tuan said young people today eat unscientifically, leading to overweight and obesity. These people eat a lot, food with excess sugar is metabolized in the liver and accumulated. In obese people, triglyceride and free fatty acid concentrations in the blood increase, leading to liver fat accumulation. In the long term, patients suffer from fatty liver, chronic hepatitis, and irreversible cirrhosis. Therefore, many studies show that obese people have a four times higher risk of hepatocellular carcinoma. This risk is 100 times higher for obese people with diabetes and carriers of hepatitis B or hepatitis C virus.
Doctor Tuan operated on the patient. Photo: BSCC.
Dr. Tuan recommends that obese people need to lose weight to restore their liver. Recovery depends on the initial level of injury, time spent, weight loss, and overall health. For more serious liver damage such as harmful non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, cirrhosis or liver cancer, intensive treatment with drugs, medical therapy or surgery is required depending on the condition and severity of the disease.
In particular, patients prioritize changing their diet and lifestyle to reverse fatty liver disease.