Cirrhosis Symptoms and Signs

What are some typical cirrhosis symptoms and signs?

Cirrhosis of the liver is a disease that lots of people will never be affected by. Even in alcoholics, the chances that cirrhosis will be contracted are only about 10-15%. If you suffer from hepatitis, however, it is more likely that you could contract cirrhosis, as hepatitis lives in and attacks liver cells.

For those who drink, there are symptoms of the early stages of liver disease which can be caught and addressed. And if you have hepatitis, there may also be things you can do to slow or reverse the progression of the disease.

Before cirrhosis symptoms are discussed, however, you should know what cirrhosis is and how it can affect your body. If you’re not familiar with the function of the liver, it is to break down toxins in the body and turn them into waste. It is said that the liver is the body's first line of defense.

Without the liver, the skin and eyes can begin to turn yellow, or jaundiced, from the toxins being released into the blood stream. These toxins will eventually cause most of us to die, or at least become very ill.

When a liver is diseased or has cirrhosis, the cells have become damaged and turned into scar tissue, tissue which does not allow blood to flow through the liver properly. This is what causes toxins to build up in the body.

It can be difficult to catch liver disease at the earliest stage, called inflammation, because even though the liver is inflamed, it will likely give no sign of the condition at all. Most of the time, if the liver disease is being caused by something like drinking too much alcohol, this can be solved by stopping alcohol consumption and getting on a healthy diet that will encourage strong liver tissue to re-grow. This might take some time, so you should be prepared to be working to care for your liver for a long time, but the benefits are well worth it in the long run.

If inflammation of the liver is left untreated for a long time and not allowed to heal, the second stage of liver disease, or fibrosis, can kick in. This is where the connective tissues of the liver begin to change into scar tissue. If liver damage is caught at this time, the liver can still manage to repair itself.

The third stage of liver disease, or cirrhosis of the liver, is where cirrhosis symptoms will usually begin to show. This is the stage where the damaged liver cells can no longer repair themselves, so the focus begins to be preventing additional damage to the liver.

Typical cirrhosis symptoms and signs usually include:

• Fatigue
• Loss of appetite and nausea
• Weight loss
• Excessive nosebleeds
• Redness in the palms of hands is another possible cirrhosis symptom
• Fluid retention in the legs and abdomen
• Easy bruising
• Belly pain
• Frequent infections
• Confusion
• Itching and yellowing of the skin

There are other effects or complications of cirrhosis, including an enlarged spleen, bleeding from enlarged blood vessels in the digestive tract, and altered brain function.

Most of these cirrhosis symptoms are caused not as much by the liver itself, but by the toxins that the liver is unable to filter from the blood and which have gathered in the body. It’s vitally important to catch these problems as soon as possible to prevent more damage to the liver.

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