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Macrophages and Alcohol-Related Liver Inflammation

Alcoholic liver disease (ALD) is a complex disease that affects millions of people worldwide and eventually can lead to liver cirrhosis and liver cancer (i.e., hepatocellular carcinoma). Aside from the direct cytotoxic and the oxidative-stress–mediated effects that alcohol and its metabolite, acetaldehyde, exert on hepatocytes, alcohol ingestion activates both the innate and adaptive immune...

Alcohol and Liver Function in Women

Alcohol-related liver disease generally has been ascribed to men because men reportedly consume alcohol at an increased rate and quantity as compared to women. Recent literature has reported, however, that rates of liver disease attributed to alcohol use by women have increased, largely due, in part, to the increased number of women who consume alcohol regularly. This increase is a paramount...

Alcoholic Liver Disease: Pathogenesis and Current Management

Excessive alcohol consumption is a global healthcare problem. The liver sustains the greatest degree of tissue injury by heavy drinking because it is the primary site of ethanol metabolism. Chronic and excessive alcohol consumption produces a wide spectrum of hepatic lesions, the most characteristic of which are steatosis, hepatitis, and fibrosis/cirrhosis. Steatosis is the earliest response to...

The Role of Innate Immunity in Alcoholic Liver Disease

Heavy consumption of alcohol poses a well-known health risk worldwide. Alcohol’s effects on health and well-being are numerous and include injuries and fatalities resulting from alcohol-induced incapacitation. Moreover, chronic and heavy alcohol consumption affects the integrity and function of vital tissues and organs, causing slow but significant structural and functional damage over time. One...

Alcohol Use Disorder and Alcohol-Associated Liver Disease

Introduction

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is prevalent worldwide, and the burden of heavy alcohol consumption has been increasing over time. An important complication of prolonged, heavy alcohol use is alcohol-associated liver disease (ALD), which can progress from liver steatosis to fibrosis and cirrhosis and frequently involves alcohol-associated hepatitis. In particular, cirrhosis—the most...

Epigenetic Events in Liver Cancer Resulting From Alcoholic Liver Disease

The molecular pathogenesis of liver cancer (i.e., hepatocellular carcinoma [HCC]) is a multistep process that involves both genetic changes, such as chromosomal abnormalities and mutations of the DNA sequence (i.e., somatic mutations), and epigenetic mechanisms, such as chemical modifications of the DNA and the histone proteins around which the DNA is wrapped to form the chromosomes, microRNA...

Hepatic Cannabinoid Signaling in the Regulation of Alcohol-Associated Liver Disease

Introduction

The prevalence of alcohol use disorder has been steadily rising around the world in recent years, and reducing the burden of alcohol-associated liver disease (ALD) caused by chronic alcohol consumption has become one of the most important global health issues.1,2 Excessive alcohol drinking (more than 40 g of pure alcohol per day) is closely associated with increased risk of all-cause...

Natural Recovery by the Liver and Other Organs After Chronic Alcohol Use

Introduction

A vast body of evidence from human studies and animal research clearly indicates that chronic, heavy alcohol consumption causes structural damage and/or disrupts normal organ function in virtually every tissue of the body. In heavy consumers of alcohol, the liver is especially susceptible to alcohol-induced injury.1,2 Additionally, several other organs—including the gastrointestinal...

Epigenetic Effects of Ethanol on the Liver and Gastrointestinal System

Epigenetic modifications are emerging as important dynamic mechanisms contributing to both transient and sustained changes in gene expression. In some cases, epigenetic changes even can be inherited, although the mechanism for this remains elusive. Several types of epigenetic modifications have been studied in recent years. For example, several laboratories have actively examined modifications, of...

Alcohol and Mortality: Global Alcohol-Attributable Deaths From Cancer, Liver Cirrhosis, and Injury in 2010

Alcohol and Mortality

Alcohol is causally linked to more than 200 different diseases, conditions, and injuries (as specified in the International Classification of Diseases, Revision 10 [ICD-10] three-digit codes [see Rehm 2011; Rehm et al. 2009; Shield et al., 2013c [pp. 155–173 of this issue]). All of these disease, condition, and injury categories cause mortality and disability, and, thus...