Fatty liver disease, diabetes and a triglycerides level of above 160 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dl) are three major risk factors for developing liver cancer, and the disease’s progression does not necessarily include chronic hepatitis or cirrhosis, the National Health Research Institutes (NHRI) said yesterday.
Liver cancer has been the second-leading cause of cancer deaths for many years, and about 85 percent of cases have been associated with chronic hepatitis viral infections — primarily chronic hepatitis B or hepatitis C — which usually progress to cirrhosis before developing into liver cancer, it said.
However, as more cases of liver cancer that did not involve chronic hepatitis viral infection were diagnosed, the institute in 2005 teamed up with five medical centers to study the cases to identify other key risk factors of liver cancer, it added.
NHRI investigator and attending physician Huang Shiu-feng (黃秀芬) said the team compared data from 411 liver cancer patients who did not have chronic hepatitis infection with 840 patients who had hepatitis infections, and discovered that risk factors for metabolic syndrome also apply to non-viral causes of liver cancer.
People who are over 60 and have at least two of the three risk factors should regularly undergo liver cancer screenings, Huang said.
The researchers also analyzed liver cancer patients who were not addicted to alcohol and did not have cirrhosis, and found that among people who had at least two of the risk factors in this group, more than 70 percent of the men and more than 90 percent of the women had liver cancer without hepatitis infection, she said.
The findings prove that in addition to commonly known risk factors — chronic hepatitis, alcohol addiction and cirrhosis — the three non-viral risk factors they have identified point at increased risk of developing liver cancer, Huang said.
Since Taiwan follows a universal hepatitis B vaccination policy and as new drugs can cure hepatitis C, the government should raise awareness in patients with fatty liver disease and metabolic syndrome so that they can learn about the increased risks of developing liver cancer and undergo cancer screenings.
Linkou Chang Gung Memorial Hospital’s Liver Cancer Research Center director Yeh Chau-Ting (葉昭廷) said about 60 percent of adults in Taiwan have fatty liver, but those who have fatty liver accompanied by inflammation have a higher risk of developing liver cancer.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
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The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
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