--- Kevin Tarr <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: <snip> > Can you answer a not related question? My friend's > father, brother, and > sister (when she was pregnant I'd assume so may not > be related) all have gall stone trouble.
Pregnancy can be associated with various liver-related problems, including symptomatic gallstone disease (up to 80% of gallstones do not cause pain/problems). [Aside: symptoms from gallstones can include right shoulder pain, even though the gallbladder is under the liver in the abdomen, because of the lack of 'point-to-point' correspondence of visceral nerves compared to those that supply the skin/limbs. When your eyes are closed, you can tell me precisely where I poked your arm, but if I could poke your heart instead, you might feel stomach upset, chest pain or even a toothachy discomfort. Weird but true.] > His brother drinks a lot of ice tea so > that may be a cause... my > friend drinks a lot of beer and water and never had > trouble. Does drinking > beer and water make it less likely for him or is it > an unrelated > coincidence? Because my brother drinks a lot of > beer, so I'd hope he'd be > less likely to have stones. Me too. No, alcohol is definitely a risk factor for liver disease, liver cancer and gallbladder cancer. Tea was not listed as a risk factor for gallstone formation in the 5 articles (eMedicine) I scanned; neither was beer, but Mexican American & Amerindian race, obesity, increasing age and being female all are. (I think smoking is a possible - some overlap with alcohol abuse confuses this a bit.) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12195163&dopt=Abstract "Cancer of the gallbladder is rare but fatal, and has an unusual geographic and demographic distribution. Gallstones and obesity have been suggested as possible risk factors. As diet is known to influence both these factors...In conclusion, the results of the present study show a protective effect of vegetables and fruits on gallbladder carcinogenesis, but red meat (beef and mutton) was found to be associated with increased risk of gallbladder cancer." (This 2002 study did find an increased odds ratio of gallbladder cancer with tea and chili consumption, but it was "not statistically significant.") A 1989 study: "...was conducted to investigate the relationship of pancreatic cancer with certain chronic medical conditions and with the consumption of tea, coffee and alcoholic beverages. Significant positive associations with pre-existing diabetes mellitus and gall-bladder disease were observed and there was weak evidence of association with liver disease...Cases drank significantly more beer than controls (p = 0.005) and there was evidence of a positive trend in risk with total alcohol consumption. Smoking was a clear risk factor, but cases and controls were very similar with respect to tea and coffee drinking habits." http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=2925272&dopt=Abstract Debbi You Just Had To Ask Maru :) __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
