Coffee protects against fatty liver disease

There seems to be one study after another about the benefits of coffee. This paper just published in the journal Digestive Diseases and Sciences verifies that coffee protects against Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD), the most common cause of non-infectious hepatitis and a growing cause of liver failure. I very often see elevated liver enzymes on laboratory tests; no wonder, since this is commonly fueled by insulin resistance. The authors of this study began by observing...

"The benefits of coffee on abnormal liver biochemistry, cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma have been reported...this study aims to investigate if coffee use has any relationship with bright liver, measured by ultrasound bright liver score (BLS), in patients with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), and which relationship, if any, is present with BMI and insulin resistance."

'Bright liver' refers to the appearance of a fatty liver on ultrasound imaging, and a higher BLS measurement means more fat deposits in the liver. What did they find?

"Less fatty liver involvement is present in coffee vs. non-coffee drinkers. Odds ratios show that obesity, higher insulin resistance, lower HDL cholesterol, older age and arterial hypertension are associated with a greater risk of more severe BLS; to the contrary, coffee drinking is associated with less severe BLS...Coffee use is inversely associated with the degree of bright liver, along with insulin resistance and obesity..."

Their conclusion is similar to numerous other studies:

"A possible opposite, if not antagonistic, role of coffee with regard to overweightness and insulin resistance, similar to that reported in hepatocarcinoma and cirrhosis, is envisaged in the natural history of NAFLD."