Few people ever consider the condition of their liver until they are diagnosed with a chronic condition.

Yet the liver is one of the most complicated and important organs in the body.

Your liver is involved with filtering the blood of toxins, producing various chemicals necessary for survival, regulating the circulation of various blood chemicals, and contributing to immune function.

To completely cover all of the critically important functions of the liver would require a library of medical textbooks.  This article will barely touch on the essentials.

Medical research has documented more than 500 functions related to the liver.  Some of the most important include:

·         Producing bile, a substance that is important in fat digestion

·         Production of chemicals important to blood clotting and regulating blood clotting

·         Production of cholesterol, which is essential to cellular health

·         Converting excess glucose (blood sugar) to glycogen for storage

·         Converting ammonia in the blood which is toxic into urea, which can be eliminated via the urine

·         Clearing toxins from the blood, including drugs and alcohol

·         Fighting infections by removing bacteria from the blood.

The liver is a large organ, weighing about three pounds on average.  At any moment, the liver will be holding about one pint of your blood.  This is about 13% of the total circulating blood supply.

Amazingly, the liver can reportedly lose up to two thirds of its cells and still function. 

For this reason, liver disease can often go unnoticed for years before it is discovered.  This is also the reason that many liver diseases have few symptoms until the condition is far advanced.

The liver can also regenerate itself.

This is good news for anyone with a liver condition that may be caused or aggravated by lifestyle choices.  That means that there is often hope for reversing the disease if the lifestyle problems are corrected.

One of the most common conditions affecting the liver is the accumulation of excess fat within the liver.  This is called fatty liver.  It may be caused by alcoholism or other factors.

Alcoholic fatty liver may be diagnosed in people that have a long standing history of excessive alcohol consumption.

However, fatty liver can occur in people that are not heavy drinkers.  In this case the condition is called non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.  This condition has a genetic component but it also aggravated by obesity and poor eating habits.  Again, the good news is that if caught early enough it is possible to reverse the condition to a considerable degree.

Fatty liver disease may be diagnosed after a routine blood test that reveals abnormalities in the liver enzymes.  Or it may be noticed incidentally on images such as MRI that show the liver.

In most cases, fatty liver will not have recognizable symptoms.  However in some cases a person may notice fatigue, abdominal pain (usually under the right rib cage) or possibly weight loss.

It is normal for the liver to accumulate some fatty deposits.  In many cases of incidentally discovered fatty liver there is little harm unless the condition becomes excessive.  However, it can lead to inflammation of the liver and possibly eventually scarring or cirrhosis of the liver.

Some of the causes of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease include:

·         Certain types of medications

·         Elevated cholesterol or triglycerides

·         Rapid weight loss or gastric bypass surgery

·         Metabolic syndrome

·         Obesity

·         High-carbohydrate diet

·         Exposure to toxins such as pesticide, other chemicals

·         Type 2 diabetes

You may have noticed that many of the causes are directly or indirectly related to dietary habits.    For example, poor dietary habits can lead to cholesterol and triglyceride elevation, obesity, Type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome.

For that matter, lifelong dietary problems are likely the cause for the person to have been obese enough to require gastric bypass or rapid weight loss.

For these reasons, it is not unreasonable to consider the liver a primary casualty of poor eating habits often combined with a sedentary lifestyle.

One of the best ways to reduce the accumulation of liver fat is to commit to a long term health eating plan that focuses on good nutrition.  For many patients this plan will be a low carbohydrate approach that includes lots of healthy vegetables.