ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES: Hepatic transit times measured by the contrast enhanced ultrasonography and liver elasticity were found to predict a clinically significant portal hypertension. However, these modalities we not yet sufficiently evaluated in predicting adverse clinical outcome in patients with clinically diagnosed cirrhosis (D´Amico stages > 1), having a clinically significant portal hypertension. The aim of our study was to assess the predictive power of the liver transit times and the liver elasticity on an adverse clinical outcome of clinically diagnosed cirrhosis compared with the MELD score. METHODS: The study group included 48 consecutive outpatients with cirrhosis in the 2., 3. and 4. DAmico stages. Patients with stage 4 could have jaundice, patients with other complications of portal hypertension were excluded. Transit times were measured from the time of intravenous administration of contrast agent (Sonovue) to a signal appearance in a hepatic vein (hepatic vein arrival time, HVAT) or time difference between the contrast signal in the hepatic artery and hepatic vein (hepatic transit time, HTT) in seconds. Elasticity was measured using the transient elastography (Fibroscan). The transit times and elasticity were measured at baseline and patients were followed for up for 1 year. Adverse outcome of cirrhosis was defined as the appearance of clinically apparent ascites and/or hospitalization for liver disease and/or death within 1 year. RESULTS: The mean age was 61 years, with female/male ratio 23/25. At baseline, the median Child-Pugh score was 5 (IQR 5.0-6.0), MELD 9.5 (IQR 7.6 to 12.1), median HVAT was 22 s (IQR 19-25) and HTT 6 (IQR 5-9). HTT and HVAT negatively correlated with Child-Pugh (-0.351 and -0.441, p = 0.002) and MELD (-0.479 and -0.388, p = 0.006) scores. The adverse outcome at 1-year was observed in 11 cases (22.9 %), including 6 deaths and 5 hospitalizations. Median HVAT in those with/without the adverse outcome was 20 seconds (IQR 19.3-23.5) compared with 22 s (IQR 19-26, p = 0.32). Cases with adverse outcome had significantly higher MELD (12.9 vs 8.5), Child-Pugh score (7.0 vs 5.0) and the liver elasticity (52.5 vs 21.5 kPa) (p < 0.05). The AUROC of the HVAT, liver elasticity and MELD for the prediction of the adverse outcome was 0.60 (95% CI 0.414 to 0.785), 0.767 (0.56 to 0.98) and 0.813 (0.66 to 0.97). Unlike HVAT, the liver elasticity > 35.3 kPa increased the risk of the adverse outcome 10.3-times and MELD score > 11 points 8.5-times. CONCLUSION: In patients with clinically diagnosed cirrhosis having a clinically significant portal hypertension hepatic transit times do not predict the 1-year adverse clinical outcome. However, the liver elasticity > 35.3 kPa appears clinically useful with a prognostic value comparable with MELD. KEY WORDS: clinically diagnosed cirrhosis - hepatic transit times - liver elasticity - MELD - portal hypertension.