Symptoms

Symptoms of Fatty Liver Disease

With ALD and NAFLD, there are usually no symptoms. Some people may have signs such as tiredness or pain in the upper right side of the belly where your liver is.

If you have NASH or get cirrhosis, you may have symptoms such as:

• Swollen belly
• Enlarged blood vessels underneath your skin
• Larger-than-normal breasts in men
• Red palms
• Skin and eyes that appear yellowish, due to a condition called jaundice

Causes

Causes and Risk Factors

For ALD, the cause is too much alcohol. You may be even more likely to get it if you drink a lot and

• Are obese
• Are malnourished
• Have chronic viral hepatitis, especially hepatitis C
• Have genes that make you more likely to get it
• Are an African-American or Hispanic male
• Age -- the older you are, the more likely it becomes.

The reason why some people with NAFLD have simple fatty liver and others get NASH isn’t known. Genes may be a reason. NAFLD or NASH is more likely if:

• You’re overweight or obese
• Your body doesn’t respond to insulin as it should (called insulin resistance) or if you have type 2 diabetes
• You have high levels of triglycerides or “bad” (LDL) cholesterol, or low levels of “good” (HDL) cholesterol
• You’re older
• You have polycystic ovary syndrome
• You have sleep apnea
• You have an underactive thyroid (the doctor will call this hypothyroidism)
• You have an underactive pituitary gland (you’ll hear this called hypopituitarism)
• You’re malnourished
• You’ve lost weight rapidly
• You’ve been exposed to certain toxins and chemicals
• You have metabolic syndrome. This is a mix of conditions that make you more likely to get type 2 diabetes and heart disease. With metabolic syndrome, you may have any three of these conditions:
• Large waist size
• High triglycerides or LDL cholesterol
• Low levels of HDL (good) cholesterol
• High blood pressure
• High blood sugar

There are also some less common reasons why you may get NAFLD or NASH. They include:

• Medical conditions that affect how your body uses or stores fat
• Hepatitis C or other infections
• Fast weight loss
• Taking certain medicines such as glucocorticoids, methotrexate (Rheumatrex, Trexall), synthetic estrogen, tamoxifen (Nolvadex, Soltamox), and others
• Gallbladder removal. Some people who have surgery to remove their gallbladder are more likely to have NAFLD.

Traditional Medical Treatment Options and Diagnosis

Diagnosis

Because most people don’t have symptoms, these conditions aren’t easy to diagnose.

Your doctor may use different methods to find out if you have fatty liver disease. Some of the things your doctor may use to diagnose fatty liver disease are:

• Health history. Your doctor will ask about your alcohol use. This information can help your doctor tell if you have ALD or NAFLD, so be truthful. He’ll also ask about medications you take, how you eat, and other health conditions you might have.
• Physical exam. Your doctor weighs you and checks your body for signs of liver problems such as an enlarged liver or jaundice.
• Blood tests. These can show if you have high levels of liver enzymes such as alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST). If so, there could be a problem with your liver.
• Imaging tests . You may get an ultrasound, computerized tomography (CT) scans, or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). These tests can help show if there’s any fat in your liver. But they can’t tell whether you have simple fatty liver or NASH
• Liver biopsy. Not everyone with NAFLD needs to have a liver biopsy. Your doctor may recommend it if you’re at risk for NASH or if other tests show that you may have NASH complications such as cirrhosis. A doctor removes a sample of tissue from your liver and sends it to a lab to see if you have liver inflammation or damage. You’ll get this done at a hospital or outpatient surgery center. Before the procedure, you’ll get medicine to help you relax or control pain. For the biopsy, your doctor numbs the area and uses a special needle to take a small piece of tissue from your liver. A liver biopsy is the only way for doctors to diagnose NASH.

Treatment for Fatty Liver Disease

There are no medications approved for NAFLD, though some are in clinical trials.

Usually the first line of treatment is to lose weight. It helps reduce fat, inflammation, and scarring in your liver. Losing just 3% to 5% of your body weight can cut down on how much fat is in your liver. Weight loss surgery is also an option if you have a lot to lose.

You’ll also need to quit drinking. It’s the only way you can keep liver damage from getting worse. You may even be able to undo some of the liver damage that’s already happened. Talk to your doctor about how you can get help. You may need a medically supervised detox program to safely quit drinking and manage withdrawal symptoms.

If you have complications due to NASH, such as cirrhosis or liver failure, you may need to have a liver transplant. In general, people with NASH who get a liver transplant do very well.

Dr. Huntoon's Alternative Medical Treatment Options

Do You Have An Angry Liver?

I wrote that title with a point in mind. If one appreciates the importance of the Liver, and the fact that its chief emotion is that of Anger when one suffers from imbalances of the Liver, there is a good chance the emotion of Anger, or one of its cohorts is present. Anger can be expressed outwardly or repressed and kept in, but either way, it will be present. Certainly, it is much better to express your anger in a healthy fashion, as anger acts as a great motivator. Its natural emotional expression supports a movement. It's used by the body to move things around when normal processes aren't working properly. For example, the body will use anger to clear a blocked artery or bowel.

Pathologically though, the emotional expression is explosiveness. Involved anger fueled by other emotions or belief systems will cause extensive damage, such as ruptured arteries or broken bones. The surplus will also be stored in the connective tissue to be released later. Does the condition Fibromyalgia sound familiar to anyone? This is stored emotion within the connective tissue leading to pain because it isn't being released. A common form of pathological emotion is when it is used to 'move' something in our way. A person may be behaving in a way we do not like, so we use anger to move them out of the way.

Appreciating other aspects of the Liver are important for overall health. The Liver can be equated to the "Grand Central Station" of the body, as everything will eventually need to pass through the Liver at one point or another. The Liver/Gallbladder together function as a partnership and are known in Traditional Chinese Medicine as the Wood Element. They represent the consciousness of the Soul, the storage site of all experience.

The Liver is responsible for planning, with metabolic activity and life adaptation.

Muscles associated with the Liver are the Rhomboids that hold the shoulder-blades back against the body wall, and the Pectoralis Major Sternal muscles of the chest.

The body areas governed by the Liver are the muscles, joints, tendons, and ligaments. Appreciating that piece, you should also appreciate that All Arthritis is a by-product of too many toxins in the Liver. It is because of these toxins overwhelming the Liver, that causes them to be deposited in the tendons and ligaments of the joints, leading to irritation and inflammation. For that reason, it is vitally important for the health of your joints that you keep your Liver clean and balanced.

The main sense organ associated with the Liver is the eyes and the sense of sight.

People who develop a need for glasses as they get older need to appreciate that it is because they have too many toxins in their Liver, and it is manifesting in the eyes. Most vision problems as one gets older can be equated to Arthritis of the eye. The lens doesn't expand and contract as it once did. It has become more rigid.

This can be helped by restoring balance to the Liver.

The fluid association for the Liver is the tears, as this helps to bathe the eyes.

The taste associated with the Wood Element is sour.

The other emotions associated with the Liver that I mentioned earlier are Anger, Irrationality, Frustration, and Aggression. Experiencing any of these on a regular basis will create Liver stress.

If you appreciate that there is a natural flow of energy associated with the body, the energy is highest in the Liver between the hours of 1 am and 3 am. Therefore, if you are one who finds yourself waking between those hours of the night, it indicates that you are having trouble keeping your Liver energy balanced. Possible causes of this energy imbalance are usually due to experiencing one or more of the emotions just mentioned, on a regular basis.

A good solution to these imbalances would be to come to the office and allow me to restore balance to your Liver by utilizing a very effective and simple technique called Neuro Emotional Technique. Through NET, I can eliminate the underlying reason for why you are storing these emotions within your Liver and the areas associated with the organ. This will allow you to release them in an agreeable way. I will also help you to develop a plan to change yourself, so you aren't experiencing those emotions on a regular basis.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• Do you suffer from Arthritis,
• eye weakness or vision problems,
• pain between your shoulder blades,
• Tendonitis,
• Bursitis,
• difficulty sleeping between 1 and 3 am, or
• have high cholesterol?

If so, you have Liver stress.

If you suspect that you have Liver problems, you should come into the office and have The Liver Detox Evaluation. It's simply letting me evaluate some of the different reflexes associated with the Liver. If the two of us discover a Liver weakness, we can then determine, through simple muscle tests, all the different components to the Liver weakness. This could include Emotions, Toxicity, Nutritional Deficiencies, Allergies, Structural components or Physiological Imbalances. And if any or all are contributing to the Liver weakness, then we can develop a plan of attack to naturally resolve any of these imbalances, and restore balance to your Liver

Probably the most common condition associated with Liver imbalance is elevated cholesterol levels. Since the Liver manufactures cholesterol, too much indicates a Liver imbalance. This is why when the MD's recommend "Statin drugs," they will want to monitor the enzyme levels within the liver to be sure Liver pathology isn't starting to occur.

Appreciate that Statin drugs suppress the normal functioning of the Liver which will lead to other complications. The most common of these is Diabetes.  This is not something I recommend doing to yourself.

As mentioned earlier, All Arthritis is controlled by the Liver. This includes the inflammatory ones like Rheumatoid, Metabolic types like Gout, and Degenerative Osteoarthritis, or Old Age Arthritis.

What Can a Person Do If They Suffer From These Conditions?

Clean up the Liver! Doing this while increasing your Omega 3 and 6 fats found in vegetables, nuts/seeds and seafood will go a long way toward naturally fighting off the painful effects of these arthritic conditions, as these products promote anti-inflammation.

Have You Been Told You Have Liver Disease? 

If so, sitting down with Dr. Huntoon, who has 28 years of helping people reverse their Liver Disease would be important.  He will help you understand everything about your liver and why it is not working properly.  He will also help you restore normal function to your liver so that you do not continue to suffer.  All of this can be done without medication.  Something to strongly consider.

What to Discuss with Your Doctor

If you suspect your liver is not functioning normally, you should discuss your symptoms with your doctor. Test can be run to determine the exact cause of your symptoms, and the severity of any damage that may have occurred.

Once you have this information, call Dr. Huntoon, as Medical Treatment will focus on suppressing your symptoms with medication that will increase the stress and CAUSE MORE disease of your liver.

Prevention and Quick Tips

Self-Care for Fatty Liver Disease

Lifestyle changes can help:

• Exercise more. Try to be active at least 30 minutes a day most days of the week. If you're trying to lose weight, you might find that it helps to exercise more. But if you don't already exercise regularly, get your doctor's OK first and start slowly.
• Be kind to your liver. Don’t do things that will make it work harder. Skip alcohol. Take medications and over-the-counter drugs only as instructed. Talk to your doctor before you try any herbal remedies. Just because a product is natural, that doesn’t mean it’s safe.
• Get your cholesterol down. Eat a healthy plant-based diet, exercise, and take your medications. This will get -- and keep -- your cholesterol and your triglyceride levels where they need to be
• Manage your diabetes. Check your blood sugar, and take medications as your doctor prescribes.

Complications of Fatty Liver Disease

The main complication for all these conditions is cirrhosis, or scarring of your liver. As your liver tries to stop the inflammation that comes with these conditions, it creates areas of scars. As inflammation spreads, so do the scars, and eventually, your liver can’t do its job. That can result in:

• Fluid buildup in your abdomen
• Swollen veins in your esophagus that can burst and bleed
• Confusion and drowsiness
• Liver cancer
• Liver failure

Can You Prevent Fatty Liver Disease?

To prevent ALD:

• Drink in moderation: That’s one drink a day for women and men over 65 and up to two for men 65 and younger.
• Protect yourself from hepatitis C: This viral liver infection can make you more likely to get cirrhosis if you drink.
• Check before you mix meds and alcohol: Ask your doctor if it’s OK to drink alcohol with the prescription medications you’re taking. Read the warning label on over-the-counter meds. Don’t drink when you’re taking products like acetaminophen, which can damage your liver when combined with alcohol.

For NAFLD and NASH, It boils down to making better choices:

• Eat healthy food. Choose a plant-based diet with lots of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and healthy fats.
• Stay at a healthy weight. Lose weight if you need to. If your weight is healthy, work to maintain it by choosing a healthy diet and exercising.
• Exercise. Get a workout most days of the week. Talk to your doctor first if you haven't been active in a while.

Have You Been Told You Have Liver Disease? 

If so, sitting down with Dr. Huntoon, who has 28 years of helping people reverse their Liver Disease would be important.  He will help you understand everything about your liver and why it is not working properly.  He will also help you restore normal function to your liver so that you do not continue to suffer.  All of this can be done without medication.  Something to strongly consider.

You also might consider doing our Doctor Supervised Detoxification Program through the office which is designed to clean out all of your body's filtration systems. These include the Liver/Gallbladder System along with the Lung/Large Intestine/Skin System and the Kidneys. 

A more complete description of the program is offered HERE. Spring Time is the best time of year for a Detoxification Program, as the energy for the Liver/Gallbladder System will be at its highest during that month. And with the expanding and growing energy of Spring, represented by the Liver/Gallbladder System, why not allow the natural energy flow occurring there to assist you in some Spring Cleaning. To truly find out what you can do to detoxify your whole body, while restoring balance to your Liver in the process call the Office at 845-561-2225. If you want to get an early start, the Detoxification Season begins March 21st, the first day of Spring.

Working with Holistic Chiropractor who is well versed in all health concerns and has experience is helping to detoxify and support normal liver function becomes vital. Especially with all the health concerns associated with the liver. Allowing your liver time to rest and heal can be vital. You can support this detoxification process by making healthy lifestyle changes. First, we would recommend stopping drinking alcohol while you only any detoxification program. Second proper diet and exercise can be vital. By eating healthy, working out, and losing weight less strain is placed on your liver. This will allow your body to more easily purge the toxins from your system and speed your recovery.