What wonderful treats we got this week with 3 beautiful nights at the pub, filled with exciting and interesting facts from "real" Scientists!
For recap', Pint of Science is a Science festival for everyone - especially non scientists - covering anything and everything in these 4 categories: Matters of the Mind, Understanding our Bodies, Physics and Chemistry, and Planet Earth!
I was lucky to be able to take 2 nights off from mummy's duties to go down the pub and listen to amazing talks, funny at times, and full of info easy to remember.
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| Pint of Science coasters - I would like to apologise to the organisers for 'stealing' these |
I chose these 2 talks because, bizarrely, I've been preparing blog posts on these exact same 2 subjects, so I thought "Well, well, well, my source of relevant literature can't be better than this!". I've already added some of the info on my first #MyBodyDoesWhat? infographic on the Liver which focuses on the liver's functions (not covered in this article). Also don't forget to check out #DYK 10 about Jaundice!
Loving your Liver - Why we should all become hepatophiles (= liver lovers)
Nathan was a very enthusiastic and lively Pint Of Science speaker. From his first power point slide, he got us all interested in wanting to know more about the amazing liver! Here are a few facts that he shared with us:
The Liver is an amazing organ and the most active in our entire body. Its filtering and detoxifying cycle occur up to 20 times per hour! It can function at only 20% of its capacity, and most amazingly, it is capable of regenerating itself in a matter of weeks, sometimes days.
Unfortunately, when a person suffers from a liver disease, he often cannot recognize the signs that are often dismissed as benign, such as tiredness and flu-like symptoms, until it's too late!
Nathan was telling us about those street check ups they performed on volunteers (e.g. blood test). Surprisingly, a quarter of this tested population had alarming state of liver damage and required immediate further check ups. It would seem as though we are not taking very good care of our liver!
In fact, liver disease is the only killer disease with rising numbers.
The number one cause of liver disease death is, would you believe it, obesity!!! The second and third causes are undiagnosed Hepatitis viral infection and alcoholism, respectively.
- Obesity: What I didn't know is that, under a microscope, the damage that fat and alcohol do to a liver tissue is identical!
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| Units for typical drinks |
- Astonishingly, 90% of the Hepatitis-infected European population doesn't know it is infected by the Hepatitis virus. One in 3 person is exposed at one time or another to the Hepatitis B virus, of course not everyone will get infected as encounter doesn't mean infection.
- Dr Nathan Davies also approached the subject of alcoholism and binge drinking, which is worse? It is quite clear that constant and regular drinking is not making it easy on the liver to regenerate itself if it is constantly under "attack". And it's not very clever to binge drink, even if it's occasional, your gut bacteria hate it. As a consequence, they can leak out of your gut, provoking inflammatory responses and causing damage. So beware, don't count too much on your liver's regeneration power!!
1. A Healthy BMI. This is so easy to check if you are in the right range
2. In case of doubt, get checked for Hepatitis infection. There are vaccination programmes!
3. Limit your alcohol intake: Here are the NHS recommendations on your unit allowance:
- Men should not regularly drink more than 3-4 units of alcohol a day
- Women should not regularly drink more than 2-3 units a day
I'll do a recap on Dr Jane's talk very soon, in the meantime you can check out this Twitter Storify for pictures from these 124 pub events happening all over the world - almost - at the same time over 3 nights!
See you Soon for more Sexy Science,
