Table 1.

Selected observational studies exploring the risk of cardiovascular disease in patients with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD)

Authors, year [ref.]	Study population	Follow-up length	NAFLD diagnosis	Main findings
Söderberg et al., 2010 [27]	Retrospective cohort of 118 Swedish patients with NAFLD and raised serum liver enzymes	24 years	Histology	Patients with NASH, but not those with simple steatosis, had twofold higher rate of cardiovascular disease than the matched general population.
Ekstedt et al., 2015 [28]	Retrospective cohort of 229 Swedish patients with biopsy-proven NAFLD	26.4 ± 5.6 years	Histology	Patients with NAFLD have increased overall mortality (HR 1.29, 95%CI: 1.04-1.59), with a high risk of death from cardiovascular diseases (HR 1.55, 95% CI: 1.11-2.15) and liver-related disease. Stage of fibrosis rather than presence of NASH predicted both overall and disease specific mortality.
Fracanzani et al., 2016 [29]	Prospective case-control study of 125 Italian patients with NAFLD and 250 age-matched and sex-matched control individuals without known liver diseases	10 years	Histology and ultrasound	NAFLD was independently associated with incident non-fatal coronary heart disease (HR 1.99, 95% CI: 1.01-3.91).
Targher et al., 2007 [30]	Prospective cohort of 2103 Italian individuals with type 2 diabetes without baseline viral hepatitis and cardiovascular disease	6.5 years	Ultrasound	NAFLD was independently associated with increased risk of fatal and non-fatal cardiovascular disease events (HR 1.87, 95% CI: 1.2-2.6).
Wong et al., 2016 [31]	612 consecutive Chinese patients undergoing coronary angiograms without knowing liver disease	6 years	Ultrasound	Patients with NAFLD, compared to those without, were more likely to have > 50% stenosis in one or more coronary arteries. NAFLD was not significantly associated with fatal and non-fatal cardiovascular disease events.
Treeprasertsuk et al., 2012 [32]	Community-based cohort of 309 US patients with NAFLD	11.5 ± 4.1 years	Ultrasound and computer tomography	Patients with NAFLD have a higher 10-year cardiovascular disease risk than general population of the same age and sex.
Zeb et al., 2016 [33]	Prospective cohort study of 4119 US adult participants who were free of cardiovascular disease and known liver disease at baseline (The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis)	7.6 years	Computer tomography	NAFLD was independently associated with incident of coronary heart disease events (HR 1.42, 95% CI: 1.00-2.03).