[Medical Q&A] What bad habits are harming your liver?

Planner: Chinese Medical Association

Reviewer: Jin Bo, Chief Physician, Fifth Medical Center, PLA General Hospital

The liver is a fragile organ that is responsible for digestion and detoxification. As the saying goes, "taking care of the liver means taking care of life." Even mild liver damage can be life-threatening, so it is important to pay attention to it. The following bad habits are quietly harming your liver.

1. Lack of sleep: Staying up late often not only leads to lack of sleep and reduces the body's resistance, but also seriously damages liver function.

2. Overeating: Eating too much food will cause excess calories in the body, causing obesity, inducing fatty liver, and increasing the burden on the liver.

3. Blind medication: Most drugs need to be detoxified by the liver. Long-term use or blind use of drugs will increase the burden on the liver, cause liver damage, and cause acute drug-induced liver injury. These drugs include antibacterial drugs, antipyretic analgesics, traditional Chinese medicine, health products, weight loss drugs, secret prescription drugs, etc.

4. Drinking: More than 90% of ethanol is metabolized in the liver. Long-term heavy drinking or short-term alcoholism can lead to alcoholic liver disease.

5. Smoking: Nicotine, tar and other harmful substances contained in cigarettes will increase the burden on the liver, affect the liver's lipid metabolism, cause oxidative stress, lead to cell destruction, tissue damage, and even fibrosis and cancer; for patients with liver disease, harmful substances in cigarettes will hinder the recovery of liver function, cause insufficient blood and oxygen supply to the liver, accelerate the fibrosis process, and induce liver cancer.

6. Drug abuse: Drugs can directly or indirectly damage the liver and cause toxic hepatitis. The use of unclean syringes or non-disposable syringes significantly increases the risk of drug users contracting infectious diseases such as hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and AIDS, and makes it very easy for these infectious diseases to spread among the population.