'Alcohol and diabetes raise risk of liver cancer'

Excessive alcohol use, diabetes and viral hepatitis combine synergistically to raise the risk of developing liver cancer. This was stated by renowned physician and Secretary General, Pakistan Society of Family of Physicians (PSFP), Dr Sheharyar Bhatti, while talking to Business Recorder.
According to him, hepatitis B and C virus infections were both risk factors for liver cancer. Compared with non-drinkers, moderate drinkers actually had a 40-percent lower risk of liver cancer, but heavy alcohol consumption significantly increased the risk of developing cancer. He maintained that heavy drinking in those with diabetes raised the likelihood of developing liver cancer more than 17-fold, while the combinations of viral hepatitis, diabetes and heavy alcohol consumption each increased the risk for liver cancer about 48 times.
Talking about diabetes, Dr Bhatti said that majority of people with diabetes have never heard of diabetic neuropathy-nerve damage that causes pain, numbness or tingling in the feet and hands.
According to him, an estimated 50 percent of diabetics develop neuropathy. People with neuropathy are at increased risk of foot injury and even amputation. Even without serious injuries, diabetics with neuropathy can become hypersensitive to the lightest touch, so that wearing socks or touching bed sheets, for example, can be very painful.
To a question, he revealed that pregnant women who smoke face a higher risk of developing diabetes during pregnancy-a condition known as gestational diabetes.
He stated that average blood glucose levels were highest among women who currently smoked, and were lowest among women who never smoked or who quit before or during pregnancy.
'Rates of gestational diabetes were highest among women who smoked (4.4 percent) and lowest among those who had never smoked (1.8 percent). Nevertheless, smoking may be an important modifiable risk factor for gestational diabetes mellitus, he concluded.
Dr Bhatti maintained that over 194 million people now live with diabetes world-wide, and by 2025 more than 333 million will have the disease. Obesity, particularly abdominal obesity, is a major modifiable risk factor for type 2 diabetes, which accounts for over 90 percent of all types of diabetes.
About 50 percent of diabetics with over eight-year history develop usually vision-threatening changes in the eye (diabetic retinopathy), he added.
Further poor dietary patterns, sedentary lifestyle and poor control of blood sugar have increased the risks of sight threatening retinopathy, making diabetes the leading cause of new cases of blindness, he pointed out.