The annual meeting of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases aka the Liver Meeting is going on now in Washington, DC. This year there were roughly 2400 accepted submissions, covering a wide range of liver-related topics. I had hope to give a summary of my favorite presentations, but I ran in to some technical problems and could not download the information I needed in time for today’s blog. I will get back to you next week with more from the Liver Meeting.

In the meantime, here are some headlines that caught my eye:

  • Exercise improves age-related inflammation, liver damage and cancer.
  • A large study in Taiwan found that daily aspirin may reduce the risk of liver cancer for people with hepatitis B infection.
  • Results from a phase 2 study reported that tenofovir exalidex, a novel prodrug of tenofovir, appeared safe and well-tolerated in patients with hepatitis B.

Again, my apologies for not supplying research data and citations. Check back for a more substantial blog entry. Hep is also providing coverage of the Liver meeting, so check Hep’s newsfeed. For those of you who want to browse Hepatology’s abstract supplement, you can view it by clicking here.

P.S.  The Liver Meeting isn’t the only event generating news. The World Congress of Gastroenterology at American College of Gastroenterology Annual Scientific Meeting met Oct. 13-18, 2017. Stephanie Rutledge and colleagues found no evidence of increased rates of hepatocellular carcinoma (liver cancer) following treatment with direct-acting antivirals compared with patients treated with interferon therapy.