Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) was described for the first time in 1980, and became within a few years one of the most frequent causes of chronic liver disease. However, during the last decade, many studies suggested a strong relationship between NAFLD and cardiovascular diseases including carotid atherosclerosis evoking the hypothesis that NAFLD is a factor or a marker of cardiovascular risk. In Algeria, data on this subject are rare or inexistent. The objective of our work was to study the relationship between NAFLD and atherosclerosis in an Algerian population without diabetes.

It is a case-control study with a strict matching by age and sex. Non-diabetic participants between 30 and 70 years of age were consecutively included in the department of internal medicine of the public hospital of El Biar. The diagnosis of NAFLD was made by ultrasound and hepatic elasticity was assessed by FibroScan®. We collected the data of the carotid ultrasound, the carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity (cfPWV), ankle-brachial pressure index and arterial pressure (consultation and ambulatory monitoring). Non parametric statistical methods (chi 2 McNemar for the percentages, t Friedman test for medium) were used and the association between variables was estimated by odds ratio (OR). These analyses were performed using SPSS 21.0 software (IBM).

213 patients with NAFLD, with a mean age of 48.5 years±10.14 (100 men/113 women) were matched to 213 controls. The presence of carotid atherosclerotic plaque (CAP) was higher in NAFLD than in controls (31.92% (n=68) vs. 7.05% (n=15), P<0.001). In multivariate analysis, the CAP (OR 8.6, 95% CI [3.6–20.5], P<0.001), high Intima media thickness (OR 2.8, 95% CI [1.4–5.4], P=0.002), CRP≥6mg/l (OR 14.7, 95% CI [5.9–36.9], P=0.001), abdominal obesity (OR 3.8, 95% CI [1.4–9.7], P=0.05), high cfPWV (OR 4.4, 95% CI [2.4–8.1], P<0.001), elevated alanine aminotransferase(OR 4.0, 95% CI [1.6–9.8], P=0.002), overall obesity (OR 2.0, 95% CI [1.0–3.8], P=0.03), dyslipidemia (OR 2.0, 95% CI [1.0–3.8], P=0.02), and elevated GGT (OR 2.8, 95% [1.1–7.1] were independently associated to NAFLD.

Our study suggests that NAFLD is significantly associated with carotid atherosclerosis and arterial stiffness. These results may have implications in the management of patients with NAFLD in terms of cardiovascular prevention.