and now helping you live healthy
research shows more young adults are
dying from cirrhosis that's right and a
new study showed the 65 percent increase
in deaths that's being linked to
consuming too much alcohol and joining
us this morning on the show dr. David
al-hassan with the st. Vincent's primary
care so we were just speaking about the
rise here it's so frightening and you're
looking at a pretty young age group
you're saying this between 25 and 34
correct I think the overall grossest on
the US has risen 65 percent very
alarming number but specifically in that
age group 25 to 34 years old that age
group the cirrhosis that we're seeing is
predominantly from alcohol use what are
some signs and symptoms that you may
have an issue going on with your liver
yeah specifically for cirrhosis which
you know the fundamental what is
cirrhosis it's it's a feared
complication of end-stage liver disease
so it's kind of towards the end of the
progression many people in the early
stages of cirrhosis have no signs or
symptoms but as the disease progresses
you can get different types of GI bleeds
specifically from the esophagus you can
start to get what's called palmar
erythema so redness of the palms you can
start to get kind of some of those
spider blood vessels that we call spider
angiomas
in the face and you can start having a
lot of trembling of your hands and a
cumulation of fluid in the belly so
these are all kind of things that we
look for in our patients so what are
some ways I know of course limiting
alcohol we were just speaking of
in the age
speaking there's a lot of binge drinking
that goes on you're right and
specifically that's a very good point
that age group of 25 to 34 has the
biggest increase in death from cirrhosis
but primarily in that age group the
research is pointing towards alcohol use
for the cause essentially I think it's a
preventable cause which is a big reason
to kind of make people aware as guys
were allowed two drinks a day
females are allowed one drink a day with
that being said not everybody drinks
every day so some people are saying well
if I get seven in a week I'll just have
seven in one day that's the wrong way to
approach it too so it's a matter of
moderation the other two big causes of
cirrhosis in the u.s. being
non-alcoholic fatty liver disease so our
diabetic patients who have hypertension
high cholesterol etc we have to reduce
those risk factors in addition viral
hepatitis specifically viral hepatitis C
which we are beginning to eradicate with
very very good treatment so I think it
goes back to making sure you see your
primary care provider we know the signs
and symptoms we'll look for but I think
the big three causes that we just
mentioned are preventable and that's the
big thing do you how often do you see I
mean I know we're seeing a rise but it
just seems bizarre I mean for a 25 year
old do you see them locally coming in
getting checked unfortunately we do and
then think about it too in that age
group of 25 to 34 the death from
cirrhosis that tells you that that is
the end of the stage for a lot longer
thank you exactly right so this this
brings up that we need to talk to our
teenagers about alcohol abuse and also
when our kids go away to college kind of
right after high school graduation going
to college these kids are hitting it
very hard and the other thing is they're
drinking very hard you know like spirits
and stuff like that does it matter if
it's beer or wine versus liquor is this
one worse okay so yeah so so when we say
you're allowed one drink as a guy or as
a female in a day that one drink is the
equivalent of a 12 ounce beer an 8 ounce
say like a malt liquor 5 ounces of wine
and then when you talk about the
distilled spirits like rum whiskey
things like that it's only one and a
half ounces Wow so a lot of people are
like oh well I had two drinks but if
there's you know if they're hitting
doubles and things like that that adds
up very quick and unfortunately right
now
you know college-age kids and things
like that are not only drinking more
alcohol they're drinking the more potent
alcohol and lots of it so by the time
they get to that 25 to 34 year old age
range they're in end-stage cirrhosis and
a lot of these kids are actually dying
from it thank you so much for coming on
and talking about an issue that
sometimes it's hard to hear but it is
important so thank you so much