Although the prognosis of
fatty liver depends on its causes, we feel from our clinical experience that
fatty liver with
hypertriglyceridemia has a good prognosis and responds well to treatment. In this study, 600 mg/day of
pantethine was administered to 16 outpatients with
fatty liver and
hypertriglyceridemia for six months or longer to examine whether the
drug improved
fatty liver using abdominal plain computed tomography (CT). Nine of the 16-pantethine patients were no longer diagnosed as having
fatty liver after the study period. An chi2 test indicated the significant disappearance of
fatty liver. At the same time, the visceral fat calculated from the CT image passing the umbilical region was also significantly reduced. On the contrary, the subcutaneous fat area tended to increase, so the ratio of the visceral-to-subcutaneous fat area was reduced significantly. This indicates
triglycerides may be pooled in the body as hepato-visceral fat and subcutaneous fat, and that
pantethine may transfer fat from the liver and viscera to the subcutaneous tissue. This suggests that visceral fat deposition and
fatty liver occurring with
hypertriglyceridemia may have a common basis, probably excessive matrixes, and that
pantethine may simultaneously improve the two conditions.