INTRODUCTION
NAFLD, cirrhosis, liver disease, impairment of the liver, Fatty liver disease, metabolic dysfunction
CIRRHOSIS, LIVER DISEASE
Fatty liver disease is the most common liver disease worldwide (Younossi et al., Most studies on patients with NAFLD are done under fasting conditions, although it is likely that impairment of the liver leads to changes in metabolism and, thereby, changes in the postprandial response. We hypothesized that metabolic dysfunction in liver disease becomes more evident when “challenged” by a meal. We therefore studied the metabolic response to a physiological, standardized liquid mixed meal compared to fasting in biopsy proven NAFLD, cirrhosis, and healthy controls in a randomized design. Our aim was to investigate changes in markers of metabolic dysfunction including plasma levels of glucose, insulin, C‐peptide, glucagon, and fibroblast growth factor (FGF21) between groups and between postprandial and fasting conditions. The nature of the study is exploratory and the primary outcome (phosphoproteomic changes at a liver tissue level) is not reported in this article.