Overview

• Researchers from Indiana University School of Medicine and Regenstrief Institute analyzed two large multicenter cohorts of patients with alcohol-associated hepatitis and heavy drinkers without significant liver disease.
• Parental alcohol use disorder was common across groups, yet a parent's death from liver disease specifically was tied to more than twice the risk of developing alcohol-associated hepatitis.
• Among those diagnosed with alcohol-associated hepatitis, having a parent who died of liver disease was associated with a higher likelihood of death within 90 days.
• Investigators urge clinicians to ask about parental liver-disease deaths to identify high-risk heavy drinkers and to intensify counseling and abstinence efforts.
• Authors call for genetic and epigenetic studies to explain familial susceptibility; the NIH-funded work underscores limited treatment options and significant U.S. mortality from alcoholic liver disease.