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“Let food be thy medicine, and medicine be thy food.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“Leave your drugs in the chemist's pot if you can heal the patient with food.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“The doctor of the future will give no medicine, but will instruct his patient in the care of the human frame, in diet and in the cause and prevention of disease.”— Thomas A. Edison🌿“No illness which can be treated by diet should be treated by any other means.”— Maimonides (commonly attributed)🌿“When diet is wrong, medicine is of no use; when diet is correct, medicine is of no need.”— Ayurvedic proverb🌿“Medicine and food share a common origin.”— Traditional Chinese medicine saying🌿“Food is medicine is not only an idea whose time has come; it is absolutely essential.”— Dr Dariush Mozaffarian🌿“Nature is the true healer. The physician is only nature's assistant.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“All that man needs for health and healing has been provided in nature; the challenge of science is to find it.”— Attributed to Paracelsus🌿“Vitality and beauty are gifts of Nature for those who live according to its laws.”— Leonardo da Vinci🌿“The art of medicine consists in amusing the patient while nature cures the disease.”— Attributed to Voltaire🌿“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”— Benjamin Franklin🌿“If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise — not too little and not too much — we would have found the safest way to health.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“Eating alone will not keep a man well; he must also take exercise.”— Hippocrates, On Regimen🌿“Health is created and lived by people within the settings of their everyday life.”— WHO Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion🌿“The good physician treats the disease; the great physician treats the patient who has the disease.”— Sir William Osler🌿“Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being — not merely the absence of disease.”— WHO Constitution🌿“Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.”— Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin🌿“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”— Michael Pollan🌿“Do not eat anything your great-grandmother would not recognise as food.”— Michael Pollan🌿“Diet-related diseases produce crushing health and economic burdens.”— Dr Dariush Mozaffarian🌿“One of the first duties of the physician is to educate the masses not to take medicine.”— Sir William Osler🌿“Good food is a right, not a privilege.”— Alice Waters🌿“Let food be thy medicine, and medicine be thy food.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“Leave your drugs in the chemist's pot if you can heal the patient with food.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“The doctor of the future will give no medicine, but will instruct his patient in the care of the human frame, in diet and in the cause and prevention of disease.”— Thomas A. Edison🌿“No illness which can be treated by diet should be treated by any other means.”— Maimonides (commonly attributed)🌿“When diet is wrong, medicine is of no use; when diet is correct, medicine is of no need.”— Ayurvedic proverb🌿“Medicine and food share a common origin.”— Traditional Chinese medicine saying🌿“Food is medicine is not only an idea whose time has come; it is absolutely essential.”— Dr Dariush Mozaffarian🌿“Nature is the true healer. The physician is only nature's assistant.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“All that man needs for health and healing has been provided in nature; the challenge of science is to find it.”— Attributed to Paracelsus🌿“Vitality and beauty are gifts of Nature for those who live according to its laws.”— Leonardo da Vinci🌿“The art of medicine consists in amusing the patient while nature cures the disease.”— Attributed to Voltaire🌿“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”— Benjamin Franklin🌿“If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise — not too little and not too much — we would have found the safest way to health.”— Attributed to Hippocrates🌿“Eating alone will not keep a man well; he must also take exercise.”— Hippocrates, On Regimen🌿“Health is created and lived by people within the settings of their everyday life.”— WHO Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion🌿“The good physician treats the disease; the great physician treats the patient who has the disease.”— Sir William Osler🌿“Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being — not merely the absence of disease.”— WHO Constitution🌿“Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.”— Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin🌿“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”— Michael Pollan🌿“Do not eat anything your great-grandmother would not recognise as food.”— Michael Pollan🌿“Diet-related diseases produce crushing health and economic burdens.”— Dr Dariush Mozaffarian🌿“One of the first duties of the physician is to educate the masses not to take medicine.”— Sir William Osler🌿“Good food is a right, not a privilege.”— Alice Waters🌿
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Reading your body

🫘 Liver and Kidney Function Tests Explained (LFT & KFT)

Your liver and kidneys are the body's two great clearing houses, and the LFT and KFT panels describe how they are coping. This guide explains ALT, AST, GGT, bilirubin, albumin, creatinine, eGFR and urea in plain words, describes the fatty liver pattern now common in slim Indian adults, and lists the food and habit steps that support both organs.

By the Farmicine editorial team·Reviewed for claims compliance·4 min read· 30s 40s 50s 60s
In this guideWhat does a liver function test measure?What is the fatty liver pattern in Indian adults?What does a kidney function test measure?Which foods support the liver and kidneys?What about alcohol?When to see a doctor

Two panels on a routine report describe the organs that clear what the body produces. A liver function test explained alongside the kidney panel shows whether those clearing systems are keeping up with the daily load of food, medicines and alcohol. Here is each line in plain language, the pattern Indian doctors now see most often, and what food can do.

What does a liver function test measure?

  • ALT (SGPT) is an enzyme that leaks from liver cells when they are under strain. It is the most liver-specific line. Many Indian labs print an upper limit around 40 U/L, and some hepatologists use lower limits for women.
  • AST (SGOT) comes from liver, muscle and heart, so it rises after heavy exercise too. An AST higher than ALT is a pattern doctors associate with alcohol.
  • GGT is sensitive to alcohol, fatty liver and bile-flow problems; it is often the first enzyme to drift up.
  • ALP comes from bile ducts and bone; it rises in children, pregnancy, vitamin D deficiency and bile obstruction.
  • Bilirubin is the yellow pigment from recycled red cells. A mild lifelong elevation (Gilbert's pattern) is harmless and common; a new rise with dark urine is not.
  • Albumin and total protein are made by the liver. Low albumin is associated with poor protein intake, liver or kidney conditions and long inflammation.

What is the fatty liver pattern in Indian adults?

The commonest reason for a mildly raised ALT in India today is fat stored inside the liver, now called metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD). It is not an alcohol story; it is a sugar and sitting story, and it appears in people with a normal BMI but a soft waist, the lean Indian pattern. On a report it shows as ALT between about 40 and 100 U/L, often with GGT up, triglycerides above 150 mg/dL, HbA1c creeping towards 5.7% and a waist above 90 cm in men or 80 cm in women. An ultrasound confirms it. The levers are the ones that work for insulin resistance generally: fewer refined carbohydrates, sugar and fruit juice, a 7 to 10 percent weight change where weight is excess, daily movement and, interestingly, regular coffee, which is consistently associated with lower liver-enzyme levels. Farmicine groups this under Impaired Detoxification (B6) and Metabolic Dysfunction (B3).

What does a kidney function test measure?

  • Creatinine is a muscle waste product cleared by the kidneys. It rises when filtration falls, but also runs higher in muscular people and lower in the elderly or very slim, which is why it is converted into eGFR.
  • eGFR estimates how many millilitres of blood your kidneys filter per minute, using the CKD-EPI 2021 formula. Above 90 is normal; 60 to 89 is mildly reduced and often age-related; below 60 for three months or more is the commonly used definition of chronic kidney disease, and is where a doctor adjusts medicines and nutrient limits.
  • Urea (or BUN) rises with dehydration, a very high protein intake and reduced filtration. On its own it is a weak marker; read it with creatinine.
  • Uric acid is a by-product of purine breakdown. Above about 7 mg/dL in men and 6 in women is associated with gout, kidney stones and metabolic strain; sugary drinks and fructose raise it as much as meat does.
  • Sodium and potassium are the electrolytes; potassium matters most when eGFR is reduced.

Which foods support the liver and kidneys?

  • Cruciferous vegetables such as cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, radish and mustard greens supply compounds that support the liver's detoxification enzymes.
  • Garlic, onion, turmeric and beetroot are traditional liver foods with modern support for their antioxidant and bile-flow roles.
  • Fibre, 25 to 35 g a day, from pulses, millets, vegetables and fruit, carries bile and its contents out through the bowel.
  • Water through the day, enough that urine stays pale, supports the kidneys more than any special drink.
  • Moderate, good-quality protein at each meal: dal, curd, eggs, paneer or fish. Very high protein intakes are not a kidney problem for healthy people but are moderated once eGFR falls below 60.
  • Less sugar and fructose, which the liver turns directly into fat, and fewer fried and ultra-processed foods.

Two cautions. Paracetamol in high or frequent doses, bodybuilding supplements and unregulated herbal powders are among the commonest causes of liver-enzyme spikes seen in Indian clinics; tell your doctor everything you take. And when eGFR is below 60, potassium-rich foods and supplements, high-dose magnesium and phosphorus need your doctor's guidance, which is why the Bloodwork Reader withholds those suggestions automatically when it sees a reduced eGFR.

What about alcohol?

There is no liver-safe amount, only lower-risk amounts. Indian guidelines broadly echo international ones: no more than two drinks a day for men and one for women, with several alcohol-free days a week, and none at all if enzymes are raised, if triglycerides are high or if you are on medicines that load the liver. A raised GGT with an AST above ALT is the pattern that should prompt an honest conversation. The Detoxification & elimination solution is built around the food steps above, and our guide to reading a blood report shows where these panels sit in the whole picture.

When to see a doctor

See a doctor the same day for yellowing of the eyes or skin, dark tea-coloured urine, pale stools, severe pain under the right ribs, confusion, vomiting blood, or a sudden drop in how much urine you pass. Book promptly if ALT or AST is more than three times the upper limit, if eGFR is below 60 on any report, if creatinine has risen noticeably since last time, if there is blood or froth in the urine, or if you have swelling of the ankles or around the eyes. Anyone with diabetes or high blood pressure should have kidney function and urine albumin checked at least yearly. Food supports these organs; a changing number is for your doctor to investigate.

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🍚 HbA1c vs Fasting Glucose: What Your Sugar Report Means

Fasting glucose, post-meal glucose and HbA1c each tell a different part of the same sugar story. This guide explains the commonly used pre-diabetes cut-offs in plain terms, why the 4 pm energy crash matters, and the food-first and movement habits that work alongside your doctor's care.

Reading your body

🫀 Lipid Profile Explained: LDL, HDL and Triglycerides

Your lipid profile is six numbers that describe how fat travels in your blood. This guide explains total cholesterol, LDL, HDL, triglycerides, non-HDL and the TG:HDL ratio, why Indian adults so often show high triglycerides with low HDL, and the food-first steps that work alongside your doctor's decisions.

Reading your body

🧪 How to Read a Blood Test Report in India: Plain Guide

A routine Indian lab report is nine or ten short stories told in numbers. This guide explains what each panel measures, why reference ranges differ between labs, what the H and L flags really mean, and how to read a report in a calm, useful order before you meet your doctor.

Explore

Impaired Detoxification (B6)Metabolic Dysfunction (B3)Detoxification & elimination solution

Frequently asked

What is a normal SGPT (ALT) level?

Most Indian labs print an upper limit around 40 U/L; some clinicians use lower limits, especially for women. A mild rise with high triglycerides and a soft waist is most often associated with fatty liver.

Is an eGFR of 75 a problem?

An eGFR of 60 to 89 is mildly reduced and is often age-related. Doctors look at the trend over time and at urine albumin before reading anything into it.

Can slim people have fatty liver?

Yes. Lean fatty liver is common in Indian adults who carry fat around the waist and eat a lot of refined carbohydrate and sugar, even with a normal BMI.

Does coffee really help the liver?

Regular black or lightly milked coffee is consistently associated with lower liver-enzyme levels and less liver scarring in studies. It supports a good diet; it does not undo a poor one.

This guide is wellness education, not medical advice, and does not replace a consultation with your doctor. Farmicine products are food supplements that support structure and function; they are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.