Chronic liver disease at initial stages often occurs with no symptoms or with very non-specific symptoms, so timely diagnosis of chronic liver disease is of great importance, and there are significant difficulties involved therein. Not being able to diagnose the hepatic disease early, difficulties with the management of the disease and treatment arise. Different aspects of the clinical and laboratory evaluation may be of assistance in providing an early diagnosis, ranging from laboratory tests, to ultrasound, to EGD, and to rheohepatography (not used that frequently) among others. Stages of hepatitis affect the hepatic and general symptoms, and morphological changes in liver tissue are presented and discussed, followed by a section devoted to hepatic encephalopathy (HE) and how it is influenced by cerebral hemodynamics and state of liver cirrhosis (LC).
Part of the book: Liver Cirrhosis