Abstract
The liver is located in the right upper quadrant under the rib cage. It is comprised of two anatomical lobes, the right, subdivided into the quadrate and the caudate lobes, and the left.
Most of the liver’s blood supply is from the portal vein, and the rest is from the hepatic artery. The vessels enter the liver via the porta hepatis, where the portal vein and hepatic artery divide into branches to supply the liver lobes. The right and left bile ducts join at this intersection to form the common hepatic duct. The lobes drain into the central and subsequently hepatic veins, which drain into the inferior vena cava. The caudate vein drains into the inferior vena cava. The liver contains sympathetic and parasympathetic innervation.
The liver is made of single sheets of hepatocytes. Other cells include T and B lymphocytes, macrophages, stellate cells, and lymphatic channels. The portal tracts are comprised of branches of the portal vein, hepatic artery and nerve, and a bile duct and lymphatic duct. Blood flows through the sinusoidal channels, which lack basement membranes, from the portal tract to the central vein. The space of Disse is an interstitium between the sinusoidal cells and the hepatocytes, which contains fluid that drains towards the portal tract and subsequently extrahepatically. The intracellular structures of the liver are sustained by collagen.
The liver function includes protein production, coagulation homeostasis, and metabolism of endogenous and exogenous compounds prior to their systemic availability and excretion.
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Bergasa, N.V. (2022). The Liver. In: Bergasa, N.V. (eds) Clinical Cases in Hepatology. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-4715-2_1
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