7 Surprising Facts about Human Liver

You take care of your heart health in several ways; you get your kidneys checked and monitor your sugar levels, but have you ever got worried about your liver health? If your answer is no, then you are not alone. Most people are usually least concerned about liver health. But as a matter of fact, human liver health is crucial to overall well-being. 

A few months ago, I was attending a webinar where the best liver doctor in Peshawar was telling how common liver health problems are and how often they go undiagnosed. 

To highlight the importance of liver health, first of all, you need to know more about the liver. In case you are looking for some interesting information on liver health, this article is for you.

Fast Facts about Human Liver

Let’s know some of the interesting facts about the liver.

1- Size of the Human Liver

Unlike our heart and kidney, the liver is a larger organ. Let me tell you how huge it is! The size of a liver in men is usually 1.8 kg while in females the liver weighs around 1.3 kg. Or you can see it is roughly the size of a rugby ball located at the upper right of your abdominal cavity.

2- Liver is probably the busiest organ in our body

Though your heart supplies blood to the body or the kidney filters the blood in your body, do you know who does the most work? To your surprise, it’s your liver!

I first came to know about this fact during the webinar when the liver doctor from Afridi Medical Complex revealed that our liver performs nearly 500 jobs in our body, making it the busiest organ in our body. Some of the important jobs performed by our liver are;

• The liver secretes bile which aids in fat digestion in the body.
• Besides this, the liver removes toxins from our bodies.
• The liver plays a key role in blood formation as well as converts old red cells into by-products.
• Moreover, the liver aids in the absorption of a certain vitamin in our body.

3- Your liver repair itself

You might have seen how a starfish grows its hands if cut. Similarly, you have seen lizards recovering their cut tail after some time… This ability in animals is known as regeneration which lets them repair the damaged parts or segments in their body as a result of damage or injury.

Just like animals, the human body also possesses such organs that can regenerate themselves, our liver and tongue. If most of your liver is damaged it can be cut and it will take some time and you will get a whole new liver.  

4-Liver health keeps your brain healthy!

A healthy liver is crucial for your overall health. It processes the toxins in your body which if accumulated in the body can reach the brain via the bloodstream causing irreversible damage to the brain. It can result in a condition known as hepatic encephalopathy which is the declined brain function due to liver problems.

5- Fat is an important constituent of liver

Talking about the composition of the liver, your liver contains 10% fats as its major constituent. However, if this fat proportion gets disturbed due to any reason, it results in a fatty liver that is a disease condition. This prolonged accumulation can result in serious liver damage that goes beyond liver inflammation.

6- You can get a whole new liver

(The first liver transplant was performed in 1963 by Dr. Thomas E. Starzl.) 

You can get your liver treated with medication but do you know in case of severe liver damage, a liver transplant is the only option. Based on the liver ability of regeneration, a liver transplant is a surgical procedure. If a person’s liver is damaged to the extent that it can’t heal or repair itself, the person is given a segment of someone else’s liver. The part of another person’s liver grows with time and forms a whole new liver in the receiver’s body.

7- Liver and sugar- a bizarre connection

Apart from other important roles the liver performs in our body, sugar storage is an important job. We already know that sugar or glucose is the fuel of our body as our cells consume energy as glucose. Our liver is the storehouse of energy because it stores the excessive sugar in our body as glycogen. Depending upon the body’s sugar requirements, this glycogen is converted back to glucose.

But what the surprise is about? Despite storing the glucose in the body our liver doesn’t use sugar energy.

Bottom Line!

Our liver is the most crucial organ in our body known to play many important roles (almost 500). Your liver is crucial for your overall well-being. You can add simple lifestyle changes to improve your liver health. So, let’s start with a healthy liver today!