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Association Between Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease and Heavy Metal Exposure: a Systematic Review

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Abstract

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is a debilitating disease with adverse effects including cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. Heavy metals can cause severe dysfunction in different body organs including the liver. This review offers the study regarding the positive or negative association between heavy metals exposure and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. The method used in this study is a systematic review based on searching in the PubMed, Scopus, and Science direct databases with the keywords of fatty liver, non-alcohol fatty liver, heavy metal, mercury, cadmium, arsenic, chromium, thallium, lead, iron, zinc, and nickel. There were 2200 articles searched in databases, and after assessment, 28 articles were selected. Positive association is established between arsenic, cadmium, iron, lead, mercury, and fatty liver disease. A negative relationship is found between zinc, copper, and progressive fatty liver disease. Furthermore, laboratory methods for NAFLD diagnosis were examined according to the obtained manuscripts. Among the different diagnostic methods, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a sensitive method.

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Data Availability

The datasets generated and analyzed during the current study available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Environmental Health Engineering, Food Safety Division, School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Parisa Sadighara & Amir Hossein Abedini

  2. Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Namra Irshad & Mahmoud Ghazi-Khansari

  3. Department of Environmental Health Engineering, School of Public Health, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Ali Esrafili & Mahmood Yousefi

  4. Student Research Committee, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Mahmood Yousefi

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  1. Parisa Sadighara
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  2. Amir Hossein Abedini
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  3. Namra Irshad
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  4. Mahmoud Ghazi-Khansari
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  5. Ali Esrafili
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Contributions

PS; Investigation/Writing Original draft, Writing – review & editing, Supervision. M.Y; Investigation/Writing Original draft, Writing – review & editing. A.H.A, N.I, MGK, A.E; Writing original Draft/Review& Editing.

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Correspondence to Mahmood Yousefi.

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Sadighara, P., Abedini, A.H., Irshad, N. et al. Association Between Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease and Heavy Metal Exposure: a Systematic Review. Biol Trace Elem Res 201, 5607–5615 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12011-023-03629-9

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