Table 1.
ICD-9-CM codes for identifying NAFLD, cannabis use (dependent and non-dependent), and other risk factors.
Table 2.
NAFLD, socio-demographic characteristics, and other risk factors among patient discharge records (18 years and above) classified by marijuana use (dependent and non-dependent) and non-use.
Table 3.
Crude and adjusted odds ratio for NAFLD among risk factors for NAFLD among patient.
Table 4.
Modification of the effect of cannabis on NAFLD by age, obesity, alcohol use, hyperlipidemia.
Table 5.
Crude and adjusted odds ratio for NAFLD after excluding patients with any past or present history of alcohol use.
Fig 1.
Cannabis use is associated with reduced non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.
Dependent and Non-Dependent Cannabis Use (DCU & NDCU) are associated with reduced NAFLD when compared to non-cannabis users (NCU). These observations suggest that dependent cannabis use suppresses or reverses the development and progression of NAFLD to advance liver disease (non-alcoholic steatohepatitis [NASH]). Illustrated schematics made use of some motifolio templates (www.motifolio.com).
Fig 2.
Dependent alcohol use abolishes reduced NAFLD prevalence observed in non-dependent cannabis users.
Bar graph described from the leftmost to the rightmost: Taking non-cannabis users/non-alcohol users (NCU+NAU) as the reference group, non-dependent (moderate) cannabis use/non-alcohol use (NDCU+NAU) caused a slight reduction in NAFLD prevalence, though not statistically significant. Non-dependent (moderate) alcohol use among NDCU (NDCU+NDA) resulted in a reduced NAFLD prevalence, though this protection was lost with dependent (abusive) alcohol use (NDCU+DA). However dependent (high volume) cannabis use (DCU) was always associated with a reduction in NAFLD prevalence among all categories of alcohol users: non-alcohol (DCU+NAU), moderate/non-dependent alcohol users (DCU+NDA) and copious/dependent alcohol users (DCU+DA). Illustrated schematics made use of some motifolio templates (www.motifolio.com).