Abstract
Fasting therapy is a very valuable treatment for psychosomatic disorders with elucidation of therapeutic mechanism which is recently developing. Although the cases of fasting therapy for liver disorders are increasing in order to correct the innappropriate life style, few researches have been done to investigate the influence of fasting therapy on liver function. The purpose of this study is to solve the above problem and to determine the indication of fasting therapy for liver disorders. The subjects were 30 cases with liver disorders (group A) and two control groups (group B and O whose age and sex were almost matched with the group A. Both of the group A and C consisted of 10 cases with alcoholic liver injury, 6 hypernutritional fatty liver, 2 druginduced liver injury, 2 chronic hepatitis, I Iiver cirrhosis, and 9 cause-unknown hapatic dysfunction. Liver function of all cases in the group B was normal. Basic liver protective regimen was performed to the all groups, fasting therapy including 10 days for fasting phase with drip infusion of 50% Pentose solution 500 ml and 5 days for convalescent phase followed it in the groupS A and B, and liver protective regimen continued in the group C. Liver function via blood sample was measured before, during, and after fasting therapy and was compared among the groups. The results were as follows ; (1) Serum liver enzymes decreased significantly after fasting therapy in the group A (for example, GPT before 47.7±4.3,after 30.5±3.6 IU/1,p<0.01l). (2) Delta values (before-after fasting therapy) of serum liver enzymes were significantly higher in the group A than in the group B and group C. (3) Significant positive correlations among the serum liver enzymes increased after fasting therapy only in the group A. (4) In the group A, Iiver function of alcoholic liver injury and hypernutritional fatty liver improved considerably and significantly. These results suggest that fasting therapy has beneficial effects on mild liver function disorders especially on alcoholic liver injury, hypernutritional fatty liver, and drug-induced liver injury via metabolic change, regulation of autonomic function, and behavioral modification due to alteration of consciousness during fasting therapy.
