[The effect of alcohol on iron metabolism]

Alcoholism is one of the most frequent dependences among people leading to organism destruction and death. Excessive alcohol intake causes a number of metabolic changes and disturbs homeostasis of macro- and microelements in the body. In this paper, the role of alcohol in the regulation of systemic iron metabolism and the effect of its consumption on indices of body iron stores and vice versa, the influence of these stores on alcohol abuse markers have been presented. Alcohol drinking increases the body iron stores. Even moderate consumption leads to the elevation of the iron concentration, ferritin and transferrin saturation in serum and the hepatic iron content. Both iron and alcohol cause the oxidative stress and lipid peroxidation leading to the liver injury. The excessive iron accumulation can be one of the reasons involved in alcoholic liver disease. Body iron stores affect the indicators of liver function, such as GGT AST and ALT and the concentration of alcohol abuse marker such as carbohydrate-deficient transferrin (CDT) in the serum.