Transient elastography for examining liver fibrosis in patients with chronic Hepatitis B

Objective:To apply transient elastography(Fibroscan),the serological examination,and imaging studies to assess liver fibrosis in patients with chronic hepatitis B and cirrhosis.Methods:1 006 patients with chronic hepatitis B and cirrhosis were checked with fibroscan to assess liver stiffness.One subject was tested by the same operator ten times consecutively to get the ten results,the median value of which was taken as the final test result.Then the same subject underwent laboratory examination for serum fibrosis marker,upper abdominal MRI,and video endoscopy within 24 hours.Finally,SAS8.0 package was used to analyze the relationship between the liver hardness value detected with Fibroscan and indexes by other methods.Results:There were significant differences between the liver stiffness values(LSM) and serum markers.The LSM value was positively correlated with hyaluronic acid(r=0.61),Ⅲcollagen(r=0.42),and Ⅳcollagen(r=0.24,)(P0.05),which suggested that both coincidence for diagnosis of liver cirrhosis was 77.8%.In 208 patients undergoing routine upper abdominal magnetic resonance imaging(MRI) examination,the results suggested that both coincidence for diagnosis of liver cirrhosis between LSM and MRI was 79.2%,and the result in liver cirrhosis group was significantly higher than that without cirrhosis,the differences being statistically significant(P0.05).The diagnosis coincidence rate in 124 patients with routine gastroscopy was 86.7%,in the cirrhosis of liver patients.The LSM in patients with gastric varices were significantly higher than those without gastric varices,the differences being significant(P0.05).LSM in patients with severe esophageal varices was significantly higher than those with moderate esophageal varices,the difference being statistically significant(P0.016 7).Conclusion:The liver stiffness values are positively correlated with liver fibrosis images and serum fibrosis markers.