• Luka Vranić, Anja Radovan, Goran Poropat, Ivana Mikolašević, and Sandra Milić.
• Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, University Hospital Centre Rijeka, School of Medicine, University of Rijeka, 51000 Rijeka, Croatia.
• Medicina (Kaunas). 2021 Oct 3; 57 (10).

AbstractThe COVID-19 pandemic was and still is a global burden with more than 178,000,000 cases reported so far. Although it mainly affects respiratory organs, COVID-19 has many extrapulmonary manifestations, including, among other things, liver injury. Many hypotheses have been proposed to explain direct and indirect impacts of the SARS-CoV-2 virus on the liver. Studies have shown that around 15-30% of patients with COVID-19 have underlying liver disease, and 20-35% of patients with COVID-19 had altered liver enzymes at admission. One of the hypotheses is reactivation of an underlying liver disease, such as non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Some studies have shown that NAFLD is associated with severe COVID-19 and poor outcome; nevertheless, other studies showed no significant difference between groups in comparing complications and clinical outcomes. Patients with NAFLD may suffer severe COVID-19 due to other comorbidities, especially cardiovascular diseases. The link between NAFLD and COVID-19 is not clear yet, and further studies and research are needed.

10 keywords...

hide…