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©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jan 28, 2023; 29(4): 656-669
Published online Jan 28, 2023. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v29.i4.656
Published online Jan 28, 2023. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v29.i4.656
COVID-19 and the liver: Are footprints still there?
Tarana Gupta, Hemant Sharma, Department of Medicine, Pandit Bhagwat Dayal Sharma Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Rohtak 124001, Haryana, India
Author contributions: Gupta T wrote the paper and critically analysed the manuscript; and Sharma H collected the data and conducted the literature review.
Conflict-of-interest statement: There are no conflicts of interest to report.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Tarana Gupta, Doctor, MBBS, MD, Professor, Department of Medicine, Pandit Bhagwat Dayal Sharma Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Medical Mor, Rohtak 124001, Haryana, India. taranagupta@gmail.com
Received: September 13, 2022
Peer-review started: September 13, 2022
First decision: September 29, 2022
Revised: October 13, 2022
Accepted: November 21, 2022
Article in press: November 21, 2022
Published online: January 28, 2023
Peer-review started: September 13, 2022
First decision: September 29, 2022
Revised: October 13, 2022
Accepted: November 21, 2022
Article in press: November 21, 2022
Published online: January 28, 2023
Core Tip
Core Tip: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and liver involvement have been a major concern since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Deranged liver functions with raised transaminases were reported in patients with severe COVID-19. On the other hand, acute hepatitis or liver failure was uncommon. Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 virus associated cytokine surge, systemic inflammation, direct viral infection, drugs such as remdesivir, steroids, and lopinavir-ritonavir were the main causative factor in raised transaminases. Patients with pre-existing chronic liver diseases especially non-alcoholic fatty liver disease were found to be risk factors for increased mortality in patients with severe COVID-19.