What to do if your liver hurts?

If your liver hurts, you need to immediately put aside all your affairs, herbal infusions, poultices, pills and go to a gastroenterologist or hepatologist. Liver pain can signal serious diseases occurring in the organ itself, in nearby organs or the onset of acute appendicitis, which likes to "disguise" itself as symptoms of various diseases. Until the pain in the abdomen, no matter which side it occurs on, in the side, in the center or under the ribs, remains unclear, until a diagnosis is made and the cause of this pain is identified, you cannot take painkillers or apply heating pads before seeing a doctor.

Liver pain as an indicator of the norm

Even a healthy liver sometimes fails, causing unpleasant and sometimes painful sensations. Almost everyone has experienced liver pain at least once. It usually appears during fast walking or running, during intense sports. It often hurts sharply, accompanied by a burning sensation in the right side. This is explained by the fact that with increasing physical activity, an incorrect breathing pattern is selected, which does not allow the diaphragm and lungs to provide the necessary ventilation and "pumping" action. As a result, venous blood accumulates in the liver, not having time to be pumped properly.

If the liver hurts, it means that due to severe congestion it has increased in size, far exceeding its normal values, which has led to the expansion of the capsule in which it is located. The liver capsule contains a large number of sensitive receptors, including pain receptors. That is the entire mechanism of liver pain development from fast walking. As can be seen from the example, no pathological processes are involved in the mechanism of liver pain in this case.

The liver often hurts when overeating, especially carbohydrate foods, heavy foods prepared by frying or smoking. In this case, the pain is explained by a lack of bile, which does not have time to be produced due to the overload of the organ. This situation is not very dangerous if it does not happen often. With constant such violations in the diet, serious problems can begin, leading to irreversible consequences.

Liver pain can be provoked by medications taken in large doses at one time or inappropriately, for example, with a violation of the recommendation for taking the drug only after meals, and not on an empty stomach. It is worth noting that if the liver hurts every time after taking the medicine, you must immediately notify the doctor. Ignoring such manifestations can lead to the development of drug-induced hepatitis

Sadly, excessive alcohol consumption in a single dose is also one of the "non-pathological" causes of liver pain. It should be clarified here that we are not talking about alcoholism, but about a single intake of a large dose of an alcohol-containing product. Ethyl alcohol has a detrimental effect on liver cells, literally killing them. At first, the cells are still trying to cope with the poison entering the liver, but as the dose increases, the liver begins to experience enormous pressure and is forced to work at the limit of its capabilities. This is where toxic damage to many of its cells begins, leading to irreversible consequences.

Considering a sumptuous feast, where alcohol is supplemented with heavy food as an appetizer, the seriousness and threatening dimensions of the situation become more than obvious. The more often such "libations" are repeated, the more cells the liver will lose.

If the liver hurts due to natural, and not pathological processes, which are described above, then specially targeted measures to eliminate it are not taken. With the restoration of breathing, after running or walking, the outflow of venous blood is resumed, the liver returns to the boundaries of its normal position, and the pain goes away on its own. Unpleasant sensations in the liver after taking medications can also disappear on their own after cancellation or replacement of the drug.

After lavish celebrations, accompanied by heavy food and alcohol, it is advisable to take a course of special medications that are aimed at cleansing the liver and regenerating all its cells.

Pain as a sign of a pathological process in the liver

Hepatitis

The number of diagnoses in which the word hepatitis appears is a great many. They differ in the degree of manifestation and severity of the clinical picture. Viral hepatitis has letter differences that correspond to the Latin letters A, B, D, C, E, F. The letters reflect the virus that caused the inflammation in the liver. "Hepatitis" is literally translated as liver and inflammation. That is, hepatitis does not necessarily have to have a viral origin, it can develop against the background of liver damage from ethyl alcohol and drugs, decay products from poor-quality food and salts of heavy metals.

Hepatitis can be a consequence of severe infectious intoxication of the body or develop after a serious liver injury. If the liver hurts and the pain is severe, the skin is normal, and the whites of the eyes are colored yellow - first of all, it is worth suspecting the pre-icteric stage of the onset of hepatitis and only then conduct differential diagnostics with other diseases that give similar symptoms.

Hepatitis can be of different etiology and different severity, and can be acute or chronic. You can study the varieties of this disease in detail in different sources, but the main thing to always remember is that hepatitis quickly leads to damage to the entire liver and the development of serious complications that are difficult to treat. You cannot delay seeking medical help. You should immediately undergo an examination and take a blood test for liver enzymes in order to quickly establish a diagnosis and immediately begin treatment.

A good preventative measure against hepatitis is to have a blood test, general, for hepatitis B virus and liver function tests, at intervals of once every six months. Such an approach to your health will allow you to have up-to-date information about all vital processes occurring in the body.

Cirrhotic changes in the liver

Liver cirrhosis is also not as simple as it may seem at first glance. First of all, it is necessary to say that this disease is also multifaceted, like hepatitis. Cirrhosis can be:

• alcoholic,
• medicinal,
• viral,
• primary biliary or genetic,
• stagnant.

With any cirrhosis, no matter what the cause, the changes in the liver are quite serious. The functional abilities of the liver are reduced to a minimum, the glandular tissue is destroyed, being replaced either by connective tissue or by areas of fibrous inclusions and cicatricial segments.

If the liver hurts, and the reason for this is cirrhosis, then in addition to internal symptoms, there are external signs of the disease and such patients can be recognized at a distance. Due to the growth of the liver to gigantic sizes, relative to the norm, the abdomen also takes on an unnaturally large shape. In addition, fluid gradually accumulates in the abdominal cavity, which sweats out of the internal tissues, due to poor liver function and pronounced congestion.

Yellowing of the skin indicates a suffering liver. When communicating closely with a person, you can notice constant anxiety and irritation caused by itching of the skin all over the body. Itching is a consequence of high levels of liver enzymes in the blood. Such people move slowly, breathing is accompanied by shortness of breath. Congestion in the liver and its poor functionality leads to a decrease in lung capacity, as a result of which they poorly cope with their duties as an oxygen supplier.

By the way, it should be noted that with cirrhosis, pain can be the only symptom for a long time that indicates this disease. A slight manifestation of painful sensations, their irregularity, the absence of external signs of the disease - all this leads to the fact that for many years a person may not even suspect serious disorders in the liver. The consequence of such secrecy is late diagnosis of this pathology, as a result of which its treatment is difficult.

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Fatty liver disease or steatosis

Representatives of our society who suffer from such ailments as severe metabolic disorders, pathological obesity, alcoholism fall into the risk group for developing a disease called steatosis. The cause of this disease is fatty deposits in the liver tissue. Fat that accumulates in the liver is not excreted and is not washed out by the bloodstream, does not break down during metabolic processes into lipids that can be absorbed by the body at the cellular level. The growth of fatty tissue in place of glandular tissue leads to a decline in all liver functions, the liver loses the elasticity of its tissue, becomes dense, enlarged. As a result, pain syndrome appears.

Steatosis is accompanied not only by pain, but also by symptoms of general malaise, poor appetite, loss of strength, and bad mood. The pain is not constant, after it subsides, the manifestations of unpleasant symptoms cease, the person most often forgets about the disease and does not take any measures to eliminate it. If the liver hurts again, this is a signal to continue treatment.

Treatment measures to combat steatosis are long, painstaking, implying direct painstaking participation of the patient in the recovery process. It is necessary to have great willpower in order to withstand a strict diet, work on weight loss. Not everyone can give up alcohol, especially if you take into account the presence of a long-term addiction to this bad habit. However, the quality of treatment and its outcome largely depend on the patient.

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Benign and malignant liver tumors

Like any other organ, the liver is often subject to the occurrence of tumor formations in its structure. In some cases, they are not dangerous and their presence only has a local adverse effect on the structure of the liver tissue itself, squeezing it, forcing the liver to increase its size. Benign tumors, which may include a cyst or multiple cystic lesions, adenoma, hyperplastic nodes or hemangioma, may not manifest themselves for a long time until they reach critical sizes.

If the liver hurts constantly and the pain is not severe, but debilitating, against the background of general poor health, elevated body temperature within 37.5-38.5, not decreasing further than the lower limit, it is necessary to plan a visit to the doctor as soon as possible. Symptoms such as the presence of nausea with frequent urge to vomit, unmotivated weight loss, poor appetite and enlarged liver, which can be determined by simple palpation, should also be alarming. If even a part of all the listed symptoms is present, it is necessary to urgently undergo an examination for the presence of a malignant neoplasm in the liver.

Liver cancer can be detected by such instrumental diagnostic methods as ultrasound, MRI, and computed tomography. Among laboratory studies, in addition to a general blood and urine test, the digital indicators of tumor markers will play a decisive role. A positive result of this blood test is a confirmation of the presumptive diagnosis of oncological liver damage.

The liver is one of the few organs that are prone to and capable of self-healing. But this ability of the liver should not be abused. If the liver hurts, you need to analyze what and when was done wrong, take emergency measures to eliminate the harmful cause and direct all efforts to maintaining the vital activity of this important organ.

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