Gupta T. COVID-19 and liver disease: Are we missing something? World J Hepatol 2022; 14(2): 479-481 [PMID: 35317182 DOI: 10.4254/wjh.v14.i2.479]
Corresponding Author of This Article
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
Research Domain of This Article
Gastroenterology & Hepatology
Article-Type of This Article
Letter to the Editor
Open-Access Policy of This Article
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/
World J Hepatol. Feb 27, 2022; 14(2): 479-481 Published online Feb 27, 2022. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v14.i2.479
COVID-19 and liver disease: Are we missing something?
Tarana Gupta
Tarana Gupta, Department of Medicine, Pandit Bhagwat Dayal Sharma Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Rohtak 124001, Haryana, India
Author contributions: Gupta T is the guarantor of the study, written, and revised the manuscript critically for important intellectual content.
Conflict-of-interest statement: I have no conflict of interest.
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 15, 2021 Peer-review started: September 15, 2021 First decision: October 18, 2021 Revised: October 22, 2021 Accepted: February 10, 2022 Article in press: February 10, 2022 Published online: February 27, 2022 Processing time: 159 Days and 21.3 Hours
Core Tip
Core Tip: The presence of angiotensin converting enzyme 2 receptors in liver endothelial cells makes it susceptible to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 injury. The authors have suggested raised aspartate aminotransferase (AST) levels in almost a third of non-survivors along with high AST/alanine aminotransferase ratio. Considering the presence of AST in organs other than liver such as muscle, red blood cells, heart and kidney, makes the interpretation difficult. Additionally, pre-existing non-alcoholic fatty liver disease has also been documented as a risk factor for severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) disease. Therefore, more studies are needed for evaluation of AST as a predictive factor for severe COVID-19 disease.
