causes of Fatty Liver?

[pinkbrownie]

Hello, I am new and this is my first question. I was diagnosed with Type 2 about 18 months ago. I have lost weight and watch my diet carefully. I have had elevated readings in the last 6 months of my liver function - I also increased Metformin 6 months ago too when my sugar levels were too high. I have had an ultrasound scan today to confirm I have a Fatty Liver....could this be caused by the Metformin? I have 1 drink a week on a Friday with a small cube of dark chocolate so this is not due to alcohol abuse. Does anyone have any experience of this please?

 

[Freema]

Hello, I am new and this is my first question. I was diagnosed with Type 2 about 18 months ago. I have lost weight and watch my diet carefully. I have had elevated readings in the last 6 months of my liver function - I also increased Metformin 6 months ago too when my sugar levels were too high. I have had an ultrasound scan today to confirm I have a Fatty Liver....could this be caused by the Metformin? I have 1 drink a week on a Friday with a small cube of dark chocolate so this is not due to alcohol abuse. Does anyone have any experience of this please?

welcome here pinkbrownie
I´ll tag @daisy1 so you´ll get the information all new members get , it is really valuable so try to read it...

about your fatty liver...
well metformine is not wellknown to cause fatty-liver but it is probably more likely caused by high blood glucose and eating a lot of refined carbs/sugars that are known to cause fatty-liver

what most do not know is that carbs/sugars/fructose(fruit-sugar) is changed in our blood to among other chemical parts into triglycerides which is the kind of fat that goes into our liver and also into our cells and makes fatty-cells filled...

actually we do not become fat from the fat-types we eat... and neither does our liver...

the best you can do is to reduce your collected intake of carbs ... and eat more natural fats and all the vegs from over the ground that mostly have very few carbs...
when already having too much fat around ones stomach one get more easily a fatty-liver.... don´t know why..

the best you can do is to go low carb and get to loose a lot of weight, that is if you are overweight..

 

[Brunneria]

My understanding is that there are a number of causes of a fatty liver,
- most health care professionals assume it is too much alcohol, but of course that isn't always true.
- too much weight gain, since some of that weight is deposited in and around the organs
- too much carbohydrate
- certain drugs (but Metformin is not considered one of these unless you already have existing liver issues)

Re the Metformin, I found this:
http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/35/3/e21

Have you come across the work of Professor Taylor with his Newcastle Diet. One of his premises is that we all have a personal fat threshold so that if we gain weight, our body starts to deposit fat in and around the organs, which can, if it exceeds our personal fat threshold, prevent those organs (the pancreas in particular) from working properly.

Can I ask, what method you have chosen to lose weight? You mention that you have lost some, and 'watch your diet carefully', but did that involve cutting fat, or carbs? If you cut the fat, and kept the carbs the same, or even increased them a little, you may have unwittingly not helped the situation.

On the other hand, if you are eating dark choc, you may already be a signed up member of the low carb lifestyle, in which case please ignore my speculation.

 

[Freema]

Hello, I am new and this is my first question. I was diagnosed with Type 2 about 18 months ago. I have lost weight and watch my diet carefully. I have had elevated readings in the last 6 months of my liver function - I also increased Metformin 6 months ago too when my sugar levels were too high. I have had an ultrasound scan today to confirm I have a Fatty Liver....could this be caused by the Metformin? I have 1 drink a week on a Friday with a small cube of dark chocolate so this is not due to alcohol abuse. Does anyone have any experience of this please?

when you write you Watch your diet very carefully how many grams of carbs do you eat daily ?

 

[pinkbrownie]

when you write you Watch your diet very carefully how many grams of carbs do you eat daily ?

I'm not sure of grams? but I have porridge for breakfast, salad with 2 rivita for lunch and veg +fish / chicken for evening meal with some home grown fruit. If I eat carbs it is brown rice or a handful of pasta. I don't check my sugar levels daily - just wee on a stick every couple of days! my bloods are checked every 3 months at the moment.

 

[Freema]

carbs are carbs no matter if they contain vitamins or fibres they still do raise our blood glucose when being diabetic the fibres only slows the tempo and the vitamins do nothing to hinder the raise of blood glucose, so if one wants to get ones blood glucose numbers down one has to count the carbs... there is no way around it.

porridge is almost only carbs...and some fibres but only very little fats and proteins in that...so maybe you start your day with like 200 grams of carbs and then comes the carbs in all the other meals..
fruits are high spikers and not really the best for diabetics type 2... fructose(fruit-sugar) is really bad for fatty liver...

 

[pinkbrownie]

welcome here pinkbrownie
I´ll tag @daisy1 so you´ll get the information all new members get , it is really valuable so try to read it...

about your fatty liver...
well metformine is not wellknown to cause fatty-liver but it is probably more likely caused by high blood glucose and eating a lot of refined carbs/sugars that are known to cause fatty-liver

what most do not know is that carbs/sugars/fructose(fruit-sugar) is changed in our blood to among other chemical parts into triglycerides which is the kind of fat that goes into our liver and also into our cells and makes fatty-cells filled...

actually we do not become fat from the fat-types we eat... and neither does our liver...

the best you can do is to reduce your collected intake of carbs ... and eat more natural fats and all the vegs from over the ground that mostly have very few carbs...
when already having too much fat around ones stomach one get more easily a fatty-liver.... don´t know why..

the best you can do is to go low carb and get to loose a lot of weight, that is if you are overweight..

Thanks for the info...I only have a little fruit - feeling like there is not much I can eat. I was 13+half stone, now down to 12 stone, dropped from a size 16/18 to 12/14. Still carry some weight around my middle. I am confused though as my Liver readings have gone up? don't eat any food with sugar higher that 3g so why is my Liver so fatty?

 

[Freema]

no I can eat just as few of the old stuff as you can... it is a serious desease... but I think better eat berries than fruits and not have all these terrible adding conditions and amputations that people do get if they fail to control their blood glucose numbers...

actually I promies myself that I´d even go vegan if that would be nessesary.. I am a single mother to a daughter who has nothing to do with her father, and if I die she has nobody, and she is not even grown up yet..
but thanks to counting carbs and eating what I can eat my numbers are actually down in almost normal range now..

 

[Freema]

Thanks for the info...I only have a little fruit - feeling like there is not much I can eat. I was 13+half stone, now down to 12 stone, dropped from a size 16/18 to 12/14. Still carry some weight around my middle. I am confused though as my Liver readings have gone up? don't eat any food with sugar higher that 3g so why is my Liver so fatty?

I don´t know are you overweight ? do you move and do sports ?

 

[pinkbrownie]

My understanding is that there are a number of causes of a fatty liver,
- most health care professionals assume it is too much alcohol, but of course that isn't always true.
- too much weight gain, since some of that weight is deposited in and around the organs
- too much carbohydrate
- certain drugs (but Metformin is not considered one of these unless you already have existing liver issues)

Re the Metformin, I found this:
http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/35/3/e21

Have you come across the work of Professor Taylor with his Newcastle Diet. One of his premises is that we all have a personal fat threshold so that if we gain weight, our body starts to deposit fat in and around the organs, which can, if it exceeds our personal fat threshold, prevent those organs (the pancreas in particular) from working properly.

Can I ask, what method you have chosen to lose weight? You mention that you have lost some, and 'watch your diet carefully', but did that involve cutting fat, or carbs? If you cut the fat, and kept the carbs the same, or even increased them a little, you may have unwittingly not helped the situation.

On the other hand, if you are eating dark choc, you may already be a signed up member of the low carb lifestyle, in which case please ignore my speculation.

Thanks for the info I will do some research. I have cut down my carb but was advised to eat it with every meal or my body would get its sugar from fat? realise this advice was misleading and now eating very little carb. - never really had a high fat diet so not much to cut down on although I have now cut out red meat.

 

[pinkbrownie]

no I can eat just as few of the old stuff as you can... it is a serious desease... but I think better eat berries than fruits ans not have all these terrible adding conditions and amputations that people do get if they fail to control their blood glucose numbers...

actually I promies myself that I´d even go vegan if that would be nessesary.. I am a single mother to a daughter who has nothing to do with her father, and if I die she has nobody, and she is not even grown up yet..
but thanks to counting carbs and eating what I can eat my numbers are actually down in almost normal range now..

Well done - hard work! I do eat berries as we have a fruit garden and freeze a lot so I can have a few raspberries, black currant, gooseberries ect which I don't need to sweeten with canderelle x

 

[Freema]

Thanks for the info I will do some research. I have cut down my carb but was advised to eat it with every meal or my body would get its sugar from fat? realise this advice was misleading and now eating very little carb. - never really had a high fat diet so not much to cut down on although I have now cut out red meat.

'proteins can be changed by the liver to glucose, but fats are very selvdom changed to glucose and if only in a tiny tiny amount

 

[Freema]

Well done - hard work! I do eat berries as we have a fruit garden and freeze a lot so I can have a few raspberries, black currant, gooseberries ect which I don't need to sweeten with canderelle x

I´was adviced from the hospital to maximum eat 2 pieces of fruit a day and only Little ones like 100grams a piece... but now i prefer to think of my health and eat berries instead.. and maybe fruits only twice a week

 

[Lamont D]

There is another cause of NAFL (non alcoholic fatty liver) and that is hyperinsulinaemia (too much insulin in your blood) which creates the visceral fat that invades the liver.
If you have insulin resistance, you probably have too much insulin.
The more high GI carbs you eat the more insulin required to deal with the increased glucose derived from the meal. That's one of the reasons why the other posters have advised a low carb diet.

 

[Sean-W]

Just yesterday I found the normal level should be between 20 - 42 yet mine came in at 63.... hence the Gliclazide increase... it amazed me as I thought I was doing considerably well with my LCHF

 

[Indy51]

Almost everything we are told about diet is incorrect, especially when it comes to diabetes and liver health. You might find the following blogposts helpful (the blog owner has been researching liver health for many years):

http://hopefulgeranium.blogspot.com.au/2012/10/my-dietary-recommendations-for-liver.html
http://hopefulgeranium.blogspot.com.au/2013/01/fatty-liver-and-its-treatment.html

Many of us with NAFLD on this forum have followed the low carb, health fat diet (LCHF) and improved our fatty livers. The major offenders to liver health are medications, carbohydrates (especially fructose) and bad vegetable oils.

 

[daisy1]

@pinkbrownie

Hello and welcome to the forum Here is the basic information we give to new members and I hope you will find it useful. It contains a lot of advice about carbs and includes a link to the Low Carb Program which perhaps you could try. Ask as many questions as you like and someone will be able to help.


BASIC INFORMATION FOR NEW MEMBERS

Diabetes is the general term to describe people who have blood that is sweeter than normal. A number of different types of diabetes exist.

A diagnosis of diabetes tends to be a big shock for most of us. It’s far from the end of the world though and on this forum you'll find well over 220,000 people who are demonstrating this.

On the forum we have found that with the number of new people being diagnosed with diabetes each day, sometimes the NHS is not being able to give all the advice it would perhaps like to deliver - particularly with regards to people with type 2 diabetes.

The role of carbohydrate

Carbohydrates are a factor in diabetes because they ultimately break down into sugar (glucose) within our blood. We then need enough insulin to either convert the blood sugar into energy for our body, or to store the blood sugar as body fat.

If the amount of carbohydrate we take in is more than our body’s own (or injected) insulin can cope with, then our blood sugar will rise.

The bad news

Research indicates that raised blood sugar levels over a period of years can lead to organ damage, commonly referred to as diabetic complications.

The good news

People on the forum here have shown that there is plenty of opportunity to keep blood sugar levels from going too high. It’s a daily task but it’s within our reach and it’s well worth the effort.

Controlling your carbs

The info below is primarily aimed at people with type 2 diabetes, however, it may also be of benefit for other types of diabetes as well.

There are two approaches to controlling your carbs:

• Reduce your carbohydrate intake
• Choose ‘better’ carbohydrates

Reduce your carbohydrates

A large number of people on this forum have chosen to reduce the amount of carbohydrates they eat as they have found this to be an effective way of improving (lowering) their blood sugar levels.

The carbohydrates which tend to have the most pronounced effect on blood sugar levels tend to be starchy carbohydrates such as rice, pasta, bread, potatoes and similar root vegetables, flour based products (pastry, cakes, biscuits, battered food etc) and certain fruits.

Choosing better carbohydrates

The low glycaemic index diet is often favoured by healthcare professionals but some people with diabetes find that low GI does not help their blood sugar enough and may wish to cut out these foods altogether.

Read more on carbohydrates and diabetes.

Over 145,000 people have taken part in the Low Carb Program - a free 10 week structured education course that is helping people lose weight and reduce medication dependency by explaining the science behind carbs, insulin and GI.

Eating what works for you

Different people respond differently to different types of food. What works for one person may not work so well for another. The best way to see which foods are working for you is to test your blood sugar with a glucose meter.

To be able to see what effect a particular type of food or meal has on your blood sugar is to do a test before the meal and then test after the meal. A test 2 hours after the meal gives a good idea of how your body has reacted to the meal.

The blood sugar ranges recommended by NICE are as follows:

Blood glucose ranges for type 2 diabetes

• Before meals: 4 to 7 mmol/l
• 2 hours after meals: under 8.5 mmol/l

Blood glucose ranges for type 1 diabetes (adults)

• Before meals: 4 to 7 mmol/l
• 2 hours after meals: under 9 mmol/l

Blood glucose ranges for type 1 diabetes (children)

• Before meals: 4 to 8 mmol/l
• 2 hours after meals: under 10 mmol/l

However, those that are able to, may wish to keep blood sugar levels below the NICE after meal targets.

Access to blood glucose test strips

The NICE guidelines suggest that people newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes should be offered:

• structured education to every person and/or their carer at and around the time of diagnosis, with annual reinforcement and review
• self-monitoring of plasma glucose to a person newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes only as an integral part of his or her self-management education

Therefore both structured education and self-monitoring of blood glucose should be offered to people with type 2 diabetes. Read more on getting access to blood glucose testing supplies.

You may also be interested to read questions to ask at a diabetic clinic.

Note: This post has been edited from Sue/Ken's post to include up to date information.

 

[pinkbrownie]

Thank you for the information - I am busy reading!