Evaluation of Nomenclature of Fatty Liver Disease in Association with Hepatocellular Carcinoma: A 14.5-Year Cohort Study in Korea.

Purpose: New nomenclature has incorporated metabolic traits and/or alcohol intake history to replace nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Concerning the performance of different terminologies in Asian population, this study aimed to investigate the risk of developing hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in persons meeting the criteria for subclasses of fatty liver disease.

Materials and methods: Between 2002 and 2021, 28,749 participants from the cancer registry linkage, who had no prior history of HCC, were prospectively included. Fatty liver disease was defined using abdominal sonography and fatty liver index. Participants were classified as having NAFLD, metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD), metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), steatotic liver disease with increased alcohol intake (MetALD), or alcohol-related liver disease (ALD) and their association with HCC risk was investigated using Cox regression models.

Results: During a median follow-up of 14.5 years, 143 HCC cases were newly diagnosed. The prevalences of NAFLD and MASLD were 19.7% and 18.7%, respectively, whereas MAFLD was observed in 32.3% of the study population. Given the low proportion of excessive alcohol consumption, we identified 3.3% MetALD and 3.5% ALD cases. Overall, MAFLD was suggestively associated with HCC risk (hazard ratio, 1.40; 95% confidence interval, 0.99 to 1.98). In contrast, the results for other nomenclature were not significant.

Conclusion: Our results suggest the importance of both fatty liver and the presence of metabolic dysfunction in relation to HCC risk and the need to reconsider alcohol intake thresholds in the diagnostic criteria for NAFLD and MASLD within the Korean population.