(The article is from the WeChat official account of Hebei Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine and Liver Diseases)
Aunt Ren is a retiree in her fifties. She recently came to the hospital with symptoms such as fatigue, anorexia, and yellowing of the body and eyes for unknown reasons. The liver function transaminase and bilirubin were significantly increased. After a series of examinations, the diagnosis was “acute-on-chronic liver failure drug-induced liver injury”.
How can it be liver failure if it works well?
Auntie Ren was confused. Why did she suddenly suffer from liver failure?
The doctor warned her that the liver function damage is very serious, she should not be careless, and she needs to be hospitalized as soon as possible.
Aunt Ren was very serious when she saw the doctor, so she immediately went to the hospital as ordered by the doctor.
The attending physician Zhang Lei asked her medical history in detail. The dispute drank pesticides, and recently took health supplements for self-treatment… Dr. Zhang Lei told Aunt Ren:
“Your liver function damage is very serious, and transaminases are elevated. At 3000U/L, bilirubin also increased to 200umol/L, prothrombin time was prolonged, considering severe jaundice hepatitis, there is a tendency to liver failure; the cause of liver damage is likely to be caused by drugs, which may be the previous The pesticides and health care products you take are related, but we need to further examine and rule out other causes of liver damage; from now on, you must rest in bed at other times except when you wash your face, brush your teeth, and defecate; in addition, because the liver damage is relatively serious , we will take blood for more frequent re-examinations, and we need to adjust the treatment and medication in time according to the test results; special attention should be paid to stopping any medicines taken outside the hospital, and it is advisable to have a light diet that is easy to digest.”
Zhang Lei The doctor finally emphasized: “You must actively cooperate with the doctor’s treatment. If you cooperate well, your condition will recover quickly and you can be discharged from the hospital as soon as possible. I hope you will recover soon!” To recover as soon as possible, she strictly followed the doctor’s instructions and cooperated with the treatment, and she did not dare to be careless at all.
That night, Dr. Zhang Lei arranged infusion therapy for Aunt Ren.
The next day, the nurse drew blood for Aunt Ren and left After taking urine and urine, Aunt Ren used a wheelchair to do B-ultrasound, electrocardiogram, chest X-ray and other examinations.
On the third day, Auntie Ren felt that her mental state was much better, she was less tired, and had a good appetite. She ate soup noodles, porridge, eggs, etc. for breakfast. During the ward round, Dr. Zhang Lei told her that all the test results had come out, and that common causes of hepatotropic virus and non-hepatotropic virus infection, autoimmune liver disease, genetic metabolic liver disease, alcoholic liver disease, etc., and drug-induced liver injury had been ruled out. The diagnosis is basically clear.
On the morning of the sixth day, the nurse drew blood for her again.
At 11:00, after the results came out, Dr. Zhang Lei entered the ward as scheduled and told Aunt Ren: “The examination indicators show that your condition is slowly recovering, and it may take some time. , don’t worry, take your time. But you still need bed rest and good treatment, otherwise, the condition may repeat.” All have recovered well, and Dr. Zhang Lei said that he can take some medicines home for treatment and review them regularly.
Related Links
What is drug-induced liver injury:
< p>Drug-induced liver injury, as the name suggests, refers to liver injury induced by various prescription or non-prescription chemical drugs, biological agents, traditional Chinese medicines, natural medicines, health products, dietary supplements and their metabolites and even excipients. During drug use, drug-induced liver injury is one of the most common and serious adverse drug reactions caused by the drug itself and/or its metabolites, or due to the hypersensitivity or reduced tolerance of the specific constitution to the drug. one.
For example, the liver is a large chemical processing plant in the human body. After entering the human body, various substances must be processed and metabolized by the liver before they can play a role, and the same is true for drugs. These drugs can damage the liver through the following mechanisms. One is the non-immune mechanism: after the drug enters the body, on the one hand, it can directly have toxic effects on the liver and damage liver cells; More prone to necrosis, inflammation, etc., eventually leading to liver damage. The second is the immune mechanism: the metabolites of drugs in the body can change the proteins on the surface of liver cells, or combine with certain proteins in the liver to form new complex antigens, inducing the body to produce autoantibodies, thereby starting the autoimmune system to attack liver cells , causing immune damage.