A patient who abstained from alcohol consumption but who had asymptomatic chronic progressive hepatomegaly, mild disturbance of liver function tests and hepatitis resembling alcoholic hepatitis (nonalcoholic steatohepatitis) developed glucose intolerance several years after the hepatitis was diagnosed. The patient had a family history of both diabetes and chronic liver disease. A lesion resembling alcoholic hepatitis in a patient who denies alcohol consumption, may be diabetic or pre-diabetic in aetiology and such a patient should be followed up with glucose tolerance tests.