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Too Much Of Fast Food Can Damage Liver |
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A recent study found that the people who have a habit of consuming too much of fast food and also do not exercise properly, are in a greater risk of having an adverse effect on their liver. The researchers of the study have stated that the harmful ingredients used sometimes, in order to make the fast foods tasty, can damage the functioning of liver to a great extent.
With a view to find out the real danger of fast foods on the liver, the researchers in Sweden have recently conducted a study including a number of 18 people out of which, 12 were men and six were women. All the participants of the study were slim and healthy adults and they did restrict their levels of physical activity to within 5,000 steps per day. The participants consumed at least two fast food meals every day for a period of four weeks and they also showed some clear signs of damaging their livers, besides putting on some extra weight. The researchers also studied another group of volunteers and then matched the results with the members of the first group by age and sex. The participants of the second group did maintain a normal diet during the study period and did not develop any sign of liver damage nor did they gain weight.
The researchers said that they have designed the study in order to find what would be the impact of doubling the number of calories eaten daily and increasing body weight by 10 and 15 per cent on liver health. They said that after ending the stipulated period of their study, they found the fast food eaters to put on an average of 6.5 kg (14.3 pounds) extra weight. Five of them did increase their weight by about 15 per cent and one of them put on the highest weight of 12 kg (26.4 pounds) within just two weeks. In addition, the researchers also noticed that after just one week on the fast food diet, the blood tests of the participants showed some sharp increases in a liver enzyme called the alanine aminotransferase (ALT).
According to the researchers, the ALT levels of the study participants were found to increase by more than quadrupled over the four-week study period. They said that usually, the physicians use increases in ALT and other liver enzymes for diagnosing the liver disease before the symptoms develop. The researchers found the ALT to rise to levels suggestive of liver damage, among 11 fast food dieters included in the study. They said that excessive fat in the liver is considered to be another sign of damage. Only one fast food eater included in the study did develop the fatty liver, however, the test results from the other participants showed a steep rise in fat content in their liver cells too. The liver cells are actually associated with the insulin resistance that is considered to be a precursor to diabetes. The researchers did not find any of these changes among the comparison group who maintained their normal diet. Thus, they came to the conclusion that there is a link between the increase in ALT and weight gain and the higher sugar and carbohydrate intake.
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