Your liver is the foundation of your body’s ability to
detoxify. The largest solid organ in your body, your liver is situated on
the right side within your rib-cage. This powerhouse organ has some spectacular
skills, including the astonishing ability to heal and regenerate itself. It’s
the main metabolic “clearinghouse” for both naturally-produced chemicals
and foreign or toxic molecules that invade your body.
The liver is in charge of over 500 separate functions. Here are some of the big
ones:
Blood and lymph cleansing
The liver acts as a big, porous filter, continually receiving both blood and lymph,
the clear fluid that carries wastes and poisons away from your cells. The liver
screens out impurities and metabolic waste products, then channels these vital fluids
back into your bloodstream and lymphatic circulation.
Digestion
When food enters your digestive tract, the liver produces hormones and enzymes necessary
for processing and metabolism. These break down, recycle, and synthesize carbohydrates,
proteins, and fats, which your body uses as fuel and for other key actions. For
example, the liver creates bile specifically to break down dietary fats.
Bile is stored mostly in the gallbladder, which sits next to the liver. The liver
also synthesizes albumin, the most abundant blood plasma protein, which
transports hormones and drugs and helps balance blood pH.
Detoxification
Your liver is always working to detoxify the chemicals it encounters — toxins,
foreign substances, and excess hormones, including thyroxine (thyroid hormone),
cortisol, estrogen, and aldosterone (affects blood pressure). Excess hormones can
cause many different health problems and symptoms.
Hormone production
One of the liver’s major biochemical functions is to manage certain hormones
and turn them into more active forms (vitamin D) or less reactive forms (estrogen).
The liver also manufactures blood-clotting chemicals such as fibrinogen,
hormones that help control blood pressure and flow, and growth factors.
Chemical energy storehouse
The multitasking liver serves as a holding area for glycogen, used for
on-demand energy between meals. This sugar storage regulates the amount of sugar,
or glucose, in your blood and — critically — in your brain.
The liver also holds mineral and vitamin reserves, including A, D, B12, iron and
copper, and keeps ready certain active cells used by your immune system.
Cholesterol
This waxy steroid is produced and recycled by your liver and excreted into the digestive
tract in bile. Cholesterol makes cell membranes permeable and is a building block
for sex hormones. About half of it is reabsorbed into the bloodstream via the small
intestine. Triglycerides are also made in the liver in response to the insulin your
pancreas secretes.
Regeneration
Incredibly, your liver is the only organ that has the ability to regenerate itself
if large amounts of hepatic (relating to the liver) tissue are lost. I
have a patient who had a hepatic cyst removed, along with about 20% of her liver.
Shockingly — but wonderfully — within just eight weeks, her missing
liver tissue had entirely regenerated. Other research bears this out, showing that
even if you lose most of your liver, the remaining 25–30% can grow back into an
entire working organ. So even under challenging conditions, your liver can become
healthy again.