- Promotor
- Co-promotor
- Date
- Wednesday 25 Jan 2023, 13:00 - 14:30
- Type
- PhD defence
- Space
- Professor Andries Querido room
- Building
- Education Center
- Location
- Erasmus MC
L.A. van Kleef will defend his PhD dissertation on Wednesday 25 January 2023, entitled: ’Fatty Liver Disease in the General Population‘.
Summary:
Fatty liver disease currently affects one in three persons globally, and thereby has become the most prevalent chronic liver disease. Fortunately most people will not encounter any symptoms. However, up to 20% may develop substantial liver damage known as liver fibrosis. It is difficult to indetify those patients at risk of advanced liver disease. We demonstrated that the newly proposed name and slighly altered definition of “metabolic dsyfunction associated fatty liver disease” instead of “non-alcoholic fatty liver disease” better captures those at highest risk of liver fibrosis. Additionally we focussed on considerations in early detection of fatty liver disease. We demonstrated that the currently widely available non-invasive tests have poor performance and should certainly not be used in elderly populations. Moreover, we demonstrated that elderly patients with fatty liver disease had similar survival as those without liver disease. This strongly indicates that early detection and treatment of fatty liver disease should focus on younger populations rather than the elderly. In another we investigated how the disease management of fatty liver disease can be improved. We found that the risk of fatty liver disease was lower among those that had more physical activity, which was measured with activity tracker watches. An important finding was that not only vigorous activity, but also moderate and light physical activity had to potential to reduce fatty liver disease risk.
No drugs are yet available in the treatment of fatty liver disease. However, we demonstrated that statins, blood-lipid lowering drugs, may have the potential to prevent fatty liver disease and liver fibrosis in patients with dyslipidemia.
- More information
The public defence will begin exactly at 13.00 hrs. The doors will be closed once the public defence starts, latecomers can access the hall via the fourth floor. Due to the solemn nature of the ceremony, we recommend that you do not take children under the age of 6 to the first part of the ceremony.
A live stream link has been provided to the candidate.