Cortisol has obtained a bad reputation due to popular media’s tendency to alienate this hormone as causing weight gain and other health ailments. While this is true if your cortisol levels are excessively high, it is important to understand what exactly cortisol is and how it affects your body; specifically, how high cortisol affects fatty liver.
Cortisol is a naturally occurring hormone manufactured by your adrenal glands, and its primary function is to regulate how your body handles external and internal stress. Because of its direct involvement with stress, popular media has deemed cortisol the “stress hormone.”
Fatty liver is defined as having excessive fat within liver cells, and while having a fatty liver is partially determined by your genetics, it may also be caused by obesity, diabetes mellitus and alcoholism. Preliminary scientific studies have found a connection between fatty liver and high cortisol levels.
High Cortisol and Fatty Liver:
The connection between high cortisol and a fatty liver is outlined by researchers in the “Clinical Endocrinology” journal, which found that nonalcoholic fatty liver disease had signs of chronic hyperactivity within their hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis, which causes an overproduction of cortisol and Cushing syndrome.
While this finding is not completely supported, and further testing is required, researchers believe that high cortisol levels can lead to fatty liver disease because cortisol promotes fat deposits within your liver.
How Cortisol Levels Are Elevated:
Now that we understand there is a potential correlation between high cortisol levels and fatty liver disease, how exactly are cortisol levels raised?
The increase in cortisol production may be caused by excessive psychological stress and excessive physical stress. They hyperactivity within your adrenal axis, as outlined above, can occur due to certain medications, such as corticosteroid, as well as excessive production of the ACTH hormone and tumors on your adrenal gland.
Fatty Liver and Cortisol Reduction:
As outlined above, there is a direct connection between high cortisol levels and fatty liver disease; however, this raises the question: Can you reduce the harm of fatty liver disease by lowering cortisol levels? The answer: Possibly Yes.
The Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers performed a research study where scientists turned off cortisol receptors in mice. By doing so, researchers noted that the decrease of cortisol levels increased the production of the HES1 protein. This specific protein works by breaking down fat deposits located in the liver. Thus, the end result is an overall reduction of fatty deposits within your liver.
References Used:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2265.2006.02466.x/full
Clinical Endocrinology: Associations Between Liver Histology and Cortisol Secretion…
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/09/080909131223.htm
ScienceDaily: Cortisol and Fatty Liver
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001447/
PubMed Health: Cushing Syndrome