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©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Hepatol. May 28, 2015; 7(9): 1258-1264
Published online May 28, 2015. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v7.i9.1258
Published online May 28, 2015. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v7.i9.1258
Bone changes in alcoholic liver disease
Emilio González-Reimers, Geraldine Quintero-Platt, Eva Rodríguez-Rodríguez, Antonio Martínez-Riera, Julio Alvisa-Negrín, Francisco Santolaria-Fernández, Servicio de Medicina Interna, Hospital Universitario de Canarias, Universidad de La Laguna, Tenerife, 38320 Canary Islands, Spain
Author contributions: González-Reimers E, Quintero-Platt G, Rodríguez-Rodríguez E, Martínez-Riera A, Alvisa-Negrín J and Santolaria-Fernández F contributed to the review of the literature; González-Reimers E and Quintero-Platt G contributed to the drafting of the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest regarding this manuscript.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (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: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Dr. Emilio González-Reimers, PhD, Servicio de Medicina Interna, Hospital Universitario de Canarias, Universidad de La Laguna, Ofra s/n, Tenerife, 38320 Canary Islands, Spain. egonrey@ull.es
Telephone: +34-922-678600
Received: July 31, 2014
Peer-review started: August 1, 2014
First decision: August 28, 2014
Revised: February 4, 2015
Accepted: February 10, 2015
Article in press: February 12, 2015
Published online: May 28, 2015
Peer-review started: August 1, 2014
First decision: August 28, 2014
Revised: February 4, 2015
Accepted: February 10, 2015
Article in press: February 12, 2015
Published online: May 28, 2015
Core Tip
Core tip: Alcoholism is associated with an increased risk of fractures and a higher prevalence of bone disease, particularly osteoporosis. While ethanol has a direct toxic effect on bone, other factors such as malnutrition, increased levels of proinflammatory cytokines, alcoholic myopathy and neuropathy, and an increased risk of trauma also contribute to bone disease. It is noteworthy that alterations in bone metabolism have been described as reversible so that the mainstay of treatment should be alcohol abstinence. Treatment with vitamin D, calcium, and biphosphonates have been studied in the general population but further trials are needed in alcoholic patients.