PGI researchers give new hope for treatment of severe liver disease
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The research, led by Rohit A Sinha, a scientist and associate professor in the endocrinology department, along with his team comprising Sana Raza and Pratima Gupta, proved that a naturally occurring hormone called dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) can help in checking liver damage caused by NASH by removing harmful fat from liver cells, reducing inflammation, and preventing liver damage.
A Union health ministry document notes that NASH is the severest form of Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD).
Terming it as "a silent epidemic", the document noted that NAFLD's community prevalence ranges from 9% to 32%, depending on age, gender, area of residence, and socioeconomic status.
This means that up to three people out of 10 could have fatty liver or a related disease. What raises concerns is that 20% of people with NAFLD develop NASH.
"DHEA is a parent hormone that acts as a precursor to sex hormones in humans. While scanning several case studies of NASH patients, we noted that the level of DHEA in them was on the lower side.
Keeping this as the base, we proposed to study the impact of increasing this hormone in NASH patients with a significant extent of fibrosis – a symptom of NASH," said Sinha, adding that the study was published in the journal 'Molecular and Cellular Endocrinology'.
"We began with animal studies. In the mouse model, we fed the experimental group with a NASH-inducing diet. When the condition was confirmed in them, we injected DHEA. The outcome showed that the severity of liver damage in 80% of the sample decreased by about 60%," he said. The results paved the way for a cellular study in which the researchers worked upon lab-grown human liver cells. "Here too, in the experimental group, we loaded the cells with excessive fat to create a NASH-like condition.
Thereafter, we introduced DHEA and found that the fat percentage decreased by up to 80%," said Sinha.
"The result has been heartening. We now look forward to clinical trials for hormone replacement therapy," he said.
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