Author information
1 Department of Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital.
2 Division of Endocrinology and Diabetology, Medical Faculty, Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany.
3 Institute for Clinical Diabetology, German Diabetes Center, Leibniz Center for Diabetes Research at Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany.
4 German Center for Diabetes Research, München-Neuherberg, Germany.
5 Section of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, Department of Medicine, University and Azienda Ospedaliera Universitaria Integrata of Verona, Verona, Italy.
6 Liver Center, Division of Gastroenterology, Department of Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital.
Abstract
Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death among individuals with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease(NAFLD), and a growing body of evidence indicates that NAFLD is strongly associated with an increased risk of incident CVD events. The independent contribution of NAFLD to CVD, however, remains an area of debate. Recently, Alexander et al. performed a population-based, retrospective, case-control study using data from four large European electronic primary care databases (United Kingdom, Netherlands, Italy and Spain) to estimate the incidence of fatal and non-fatal acute myocardial infarction (AMI) and ischemic/unspecified stroke in patients with NAFLD compared to the general population after adjustment for traditional CVD risk factors.