Combined liver and other health risks linked to higher mortality
Adults with high liver risk and advanced heart-kidney-metabolic risk had 621% higher relative mortality risk than those with low liver risk and early-stage risk.
Limit: Liver risk was defined using the FIB-4 index rather than direct measurement
Edited by Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News
An observational study of 28,056 US adults examined liver scarring risk alongside a combined measure of heart, kidney and metabolic health over a median follow-up of 9.08 years. Metabolic health concerns how the body processes and uses energy. Researchers grouped participants by a liver risk index and by early or advanced stages of the combined measure.
Compared with adults with low liver risk and early-stage heart-kidney-metabolic risk, those with high liver risk and advanced stages had a 621% higher relative risk of death from any cause. Their relative risk of death from heart or blood vessel disease was 1,307% higher. High liver risk was also linked to higher mortality at early stages of the combined measure. At high liver risk, advanced heart-kidney-metabolic stages were not significantly linked to further mortality risk.
Why it matters
Heart and kidney disease affect health in later life. The authors proposed a broader risk-assessment framework that also includes liver scarring risk.
Caveats
This observational analysis cannot establish cause and effect, and it defined liver risk using an index. The report is a conference abstract.
- Cardiometabolic disease
- Liver fibrosis
- CKM stage
- Combined CKM stage and FIB-4 risk phenotype
- FIB-4 index
- Humans
The paper
the First Affiliated Hospital of Xi'an Jiaotong University
ESC Congress 2026 Abstract, Oct 26, 2026
Presented at ESC Congress 2026
