Review
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Sep 28, 2016; 22(36): 8078-8093
Published online Sep 28, 2016. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v22.i36.8078
Pediatric non-alcoholic fatty liver disease: Recent solutions, unresolved issues, and future research directions
Maria Grazia Clemente, Claudia Mandato, Marco Poeta, Pietro Vajro
Maria Grazia Clemente, Pediatric Clinic, Department of Surgical, Microsurgical and Medical Sciences, University of Sassari, 07100 Sassari, Italy
Claudia Mandato, Pediatrics of AORN Santobono-Pausilipon, 80123 Naples, Italy
Marco Poeta, Pietro Vajro, Pediatrics, Department of Medicine, Surgery and Dentistry - “Scuola Medica Salernitana”, University of Salerno, 84081 Baronissi, Italy
Pietro Vajro, ELFID European Laboratory for the Investigation of Food Induced Disease, 80138 Naples, Italy
Author contributions: Clemente MG and Mandato C contributed equally; Clemente MG, Mandato C and Vajro P reviewed the literature of NAFLD therapy, diagnosis and pathogenesis, respectively; Poeta M assembled references, figures and tables; all participated to writing the paper; Vajro P reviewed the final version which was agreed by everyone.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare there are no conflicts of interest in the content of this review.
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: Pietro Vajro, MD, Professor, Chair of Pediatrics, Pediatrics, Department of Medicine, Surgery and Dentistry - “Scuola Medica Salernitana”, University of Salerno, via Allende, 84081 Baronissi, Italy. pvajro@unisa.it
Telephone: +39-339-2361008 Fax: +39-089-672409
Received: June 30, 2013
Peer-review started: July 1, 2016
First decision: July 29, 2016
Revised: August 4, 2016
Accepted: August 23, 2016
Article in press: August 23, 2016
Published online: September 28, 2016
Processing time: 87 Days and 9.2 Hours
Core Tip

Core tip: Due to the high prevalence of obesity worldwide, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), the hepatic manifestation of metabolic syndrome, represents the most common chronic liver disease in children living in industrialized countries. The present review summarizes the currently available knowledge on NAFLD pathogenesis, diagnosis and treatment, highlights new research achievements that will likely influence therapeutic strategies and discusses possible future directions in pediatric research.