Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and its relationship with cardiovascular disease and other extrahepatic diseases

' initiated in part by liver-secreted cytokines and molecules. Consequently, the pathophysiological effects of NAFLD extend beyond the liver with a large body of clinical evidence demonstrating NAFLD to be independently associated with both prevalent and incident cardiovascular disease (CVD), chronic kidney disease (CKD) and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). The magnitude of risk of developing these extrahepatic diseases parallels the underlying severity of NAFLD, such that patients with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) appear to be at greater risk of incident CVD, CKD and T2DM than those with simple steatosis. Other modifiers of risk may include genetic variants (eg, patatin-like phospholipase…