Alcohol Abuse Advice

Resveratrol Supplements may Help Alcohol Induced Liver Diseases

Lately there has been much research done on resveratrol and a few have found that it can be incredibly beneficial for alcohol induced liver damage. So what causes alcohol damage to liver exactly? Well it is in part because it stops the actions of two important proteins SIRT1 and AMPK. The role these proteins play is helping the liver break down fat and getting them out of the liver. When alcohol stops these proteins from doing their job, fat starts to build up in the liver and this is what causes cirrhosis and fibrosis.

One exciting study determined if resveratrol was able to help prevent liver disease, and their results prove promising. They had four groups of mice; a control group, control group with resveratrol, mice that ingested alcohol, and mice that ingested alcohol with resveratrol. They diluted alcohol in the water at a rate of 10% for the first, 20% for the second, 30% for the third, 40% for weeks four and on. They found that in the alcohol group mice began dying in the second week, and only four out of 18 survived to the seventh week. While the group ingesting resveratrol and alcohol had a much lower mortality rate; one after the fourth week and 14 out of 18 of the mice survived to the seventh week! (1)

Another study performed found that resveratrol actually helped upregulate the SIRT1 and AMPK, which in turn would help break down fat in the liver, and decrease the chances of cirrhosis and fibrosis, or at least stall it. In their study they did indeed find that mice ingesting alcohol and resveratrol had increased rates of fatty acid oxidation (2).

Overall these findings are very interesting, and even though were only done on mice still show some promise for humans; hopefully in the near future.

References

1. Arenas, Juan I., Joseba Bidaurrazaga, Luis Bujanda, et al. “Effect of resveratrol on alcohol-induced mortality and liver lesions in mice.” BMC Gastroenterol 6 (2006). PubMed Central. <http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi’artid=1657014>.

2. Ajmo, Joanne M., Xiaomei Liang, Christopher Q. Rogers, Brandi Pennock, and Min You. “Resveratrol alleviates alcoholic fatty liver in mice.” Am J Physiol Gastrointest Liver Physiol 295 (2008): G833-842. AJP – Gastrointestinal and Liver Physiology. <http://ajpgi.physiology.org/cgi/content/abstract/295/4/G833>.