What causes liver cancer in young people? 5 reasons why smoking and drinking lead to liver cancer

Liver cancer is a malignant tumor of the liver. It is a common and frequently occurring disease among surgical diseases. Malignant tumors of the liver can be divided into two categories: primary and secondary. Do you know the causes of liver cancer?

As the number of patients with liver diseases increases, the number of patients with liver cancer also increases. Liver cancer has now become our second largest cancer, second only to lung cancer.

Causes of liver cancer in young people

Smoking

Excessive smoking is one of the causes of liver cancer in young people. Cigarette smoke contains a variety of substances that can cause cell mutations.

alcoholism

Frequent excessive drinking causes the stomach to be repeatedly subjected to the adverse stimulation of ethanol, especially strong liquor with a high ethanol content, which can easily cause chronic stomach inflammation and severe hyperplasia of the gastric mucosa.

Hepatitis B

If you are infected with hepatitis B at a young age and neglect treatment, it may turn into cancer.

Improper diet

The causes of liver cancer include eating salted fish, bacon, salted eggs and other pickled foods, or liking smoked and grilled foods. These foods contain more nitrates, which can be converted into nitrosamine compounds in the stomach, which are the culprits of liver cancer. Some young people eat too fast or eat too much, which often increases the burden on the gastrointestinal tract. There are also young people who like to eat hot pot and spicy hot pot, which also creates conditions for the occurrence of liver cancer. Therefore, you should eat more fresh vegetables, the vitamin C in which can block the formation of nitrosamines in the body.

Mental stress

The pace of work and life for young people is accelerating, and social competition has also increased their psychological pressure. They are in a state of constant mental stress, which can also induce stomach diseases and even liver cancer in a feedback manner.

Common early symptoms of liver cancer

1. Significant decrease in appetite

Abdominal distension, indigestion, and sometimes nausea and vomiting.

2. Liver pain

There may be persistent or intermittent pain in the liver area, which may sometimes be aggravated by changes in body position. It may radiate to the back or right shoulder. Advanced liver cancer may suddenly cause severe abdominal pain and peritoneal irritation, which may be caused by necrosis of the tumor nodules or bleeding into the abdominal cavity. At this time, patients often go to the emergency room for treatment with symptoms of acute abdomen.

3. Jaundice, ascites, and skin itching

This is a common symptom of liver cancer. About 1/3 of the cases have jaundice during the course of the disease. The cause of jaundice is that the tumor invades the main bile duct in the liver, and the metastatic cancer of the portal lymph nodes compresses the extrahepatic bile duct. Ascites is often caused by the patient's original liver cirrhosis, the invasion of cancer tissue into the vein to form a cancer thrombus, and the compression of the portal vein by cancer nodules. Ascites often accumulates very quickly and can be straw yellow or bloody. Skin itching is a common symptom of patients with liver disease and liver cancer.

4. Bleeding

It often manifests as nose bleeding and subcutaneous bleeding, which is mostly caused by liver tissue destruction and liver failure. Portal hypertension can cause esophageal and gastric varicose vein rupture and bleeding. When cancerous tissue invades the bile duct at the liver portal, it can cause bile duct bleeding.

5. Systemic failure

Severe fatigue, weight loss, progressive anemia and edema.

6. Hepatomegaly, splenomegaly, fever

90% of liver cancers have liver enlargement. The enlarged liver is often hard and irregular in appearance, with nodules of varying sizes on the edges. Giant liver cancer can sometimes deform the liver, making it difficult to distinguish during palpation. Splenomegaly mostly occurs in patients with liver cancer and cirrhosis. Splenic metastasis is extremely rare. Fever is quite common in patients with liver cancer, which may be caused by ischemic necrosis of cancer tissue, absorption of necrotic products, and concurrent infection.