What causes excess fat in the liver?

Fatty liver disease often has no symptoms, particularly when it is mild. However, a person may feel pain and discomfort around the liver.

What you need to know:

Fat from a person’s diet is usually metabolised by the liver and other tissues. If the amount of fat exceeds what is required by the body, it is stored in the fatty tissue. Fat can also come from other parts of the body to accumulate in the liver.

Dear Doctor: What is fatty liver? Recently, I went for a scan and I was told I have a fatty liver.
Jane Nakamatte

Dear Jane: Fatty liver is the build-up of excess fat in the liver cells. It is normal for the liver to contain some fat. But if fat accounts for more than 10 per cent of your liver’s weight, then you have fatty liver and you may develop more serious complications.
Fatty liver may cause no damage, and have no symptoms, but sometimes, the excess fat leads to inflammation of the liver though many times, this inflammation results from the cause of fatty liver (such as alcohol use).

An inflamed liver may become scarred and hardened over time, in a condition called cirrhosis, which may be serious and often leads to liver failure. Eating excess fat causes fat to build up in the liver. When the liver does not break down fats as it should, fat will accumulate. People tend to develop fatty liver if they have other conditions such as obesity, diabetes, or high blood fats.

Alcohol abuse, rapid weight loss and malnutrition may also lead to fatty liver. However, some people develop fatty liver without reason, while in others it may happen after pregnancy.

Losing at least one kilogramme of weight per week, is a safe way to prevent fatty liver or further fatty liver damage. You can also prevent it by keeping away from all forms of fat, whether though medication or diet, depending on the doctor’s discretion. Controlling diabetes, eating a balanced, healthy diet, avoiding alcohol, and drugs that have not been prescribed by the doctor, increasing physical activity are recommended ways to prevent a fatty liver. Beside all these, it is important to undergo regular health checkups.

Dear Doctor: Explain to me what artificial eyes are. Is it true they are got from sheep?
Desire

Dear Desire: An ocular prosthesis is an artificial eye that is used to replace a natural one, following the removal of an eye either medically, or due to an injury or accident.
It is merely cosmetic, does not provide vision and the person remains blind in the affected eye. Because this artificial eye is fixed, it is rumoured to be from a dead sheep. Today, a person may use a visual prosthesis which is an artificial eye that can restore vision, and of an African eye colour that will not risk them being teased about it being got from a dead sheep.

Dear Doctor: Since becoming pregnant, I have been having an on-and-off vaginal discharge that is itchy, and smells like spoilt milk. My clitoris is also swollen. I have used salt and medicine but this has not been helpful. What can I do?
Stella Kaleete

Dear Stella: A vaginal discharge is useful in keeping the vagina moist. It also helps to push out old, worn out cells and excess small organisms, thereby acting as a cleanser. When a discharge looks like spoilt milk and is associated with itching, it may be an indication of a yeast (candida albicans) infection.

The yeast, which is found in the vaginal canal in small numbers, without causing health problems, may overgrow and lead to infection. This can happen due to hormonal changes related to pregnancy or because of additional factors such as taking broad spectrum antibiotics, (such as Amoxyl), use of medicated soaps to wash genitals, and diseases such as diabetes or those that reduce the body’s ability to fight infections (HIV).
Sometimes, a woman may not be diabetic, only for her to develop the disease during pregnancy and then suffer from recurrent candida infections.

Successful treatment of yeast infection requires addressing the associated causes, as well as drugs which may be in the form of oral or vaginal tablets or creams. A pregnant woman, more than anybody else, should avoid self-prescription of drugs because they are likely to affect her health or that of the unborn child. Please visit your antenatal clinic for further help.

Dear Doctor: I am 22. I have noticed that at night, I discover patches of liquid on my bed that does not smell like urine. It mostly occurs during the weekend. I am not married yet. Don’t you think when I marry I will get problems?
Anasto Kyembe

Dear Anasto: A wet dream is when one ejaculates while asleep and dreams about sex. In some cases, even though a person may be dreaming, they may not recall anything about the dream. When we sleep, during the type of sleep called rapid eye movement (the period when most dreams happen), a person is able to erect. This kind of sleep is convenient for wet dreaming. Though wet dreams happen with erections, sometimes a person can get them without an erection.

Puberty in some boys starts from between the ages of 10 and 14, and may go on up to the early 20s. Sperm production in the testicles usually begins from the age of 12 and 13, and continues throughout life. The number of sperm cells produced varies with the size of the testicles, but averages 85 million sperm per day per testicle, and decreases as a person gets older.

Wet dreams start with puberty when a boy starts producing sperms. The sperms build up when they are not ejaculated, and a wet dream helps to release them.

Therefore, wet dreams are normal even when they occur frequently. When a boy grows up and starts having sex or masturbating, the likelihood of wet dreams reduces or even stops. It is likely that when you get married, you will stop having wet dreams but should not be reason for you to start having sex with anyone or marry early just to stop the wet dreams, which are harmless. Although rare, a few girls also usually get wet dreams.