Comparison of LecT-Hepa and FibroScan for assessment of liver fibrosis in hepatitis B virus infected patients with different ALT levels.
BACKGROUND
FibroScan is one of the noninvasive techniques based on the transient elastography that can assess the progression of liver fibrosis in chronic hepatitis patients in daily clinical practice. Recently, LecT-Hepa was validated as a serological glycomarker correlating well with the fibrosis stage determined by liver biopsy, and was superior to many other noninvasive biochemical markers and tests. We compared the reliability of LecT-Hepa with that of FibroScan for evaluation of liver fibrosis.


METHODS
The effects of increased alanine aminotransferase (ALT) activities on LecT-Hepa and FibroScan were investigated.


RESULTS
The areas under the receiver-operating characteristic curves, sensitivity and specificity for detecting cirrhosis, which is one of the outcomes of fibrosis estimation, were 0.82, 72.5% and 78.2% of LecT-Hepa, 0.85, 87.0% and 74.1% of FibroScan; these did not differ significantly. The count distribution of LecT-Hepa in non-cirrhosis group or cirrhosis group did not differ between the patients grouped according to their ALT levels, whereas that of FibroScan was substantially affected.


CONCLUSIONS
LecT-Hepa was confirmed as a reliable noninvasive test for the evaluation of liver fibrosis in hepatitis B virus-infected patients with comparable performance to that of FibroScan and proved to be unaffected by inflammation.
Department of Infectious Diseases, Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, 197 Ruijin Er Road, Shanghai 200025, China.
Dongning
D
Du
Xuejuan
X
Zhu
Atsushi
A
Kuno
Atsushi
A
Matsuda
Chikayuki
C
Tsuruno
Demin
D
Yu
Yan
Y
Zhang
Yuzuru
Y
Ikehara
Yasuhito
Y
Tanaka
Xinxin
X
Zhang
Hisashi
H
Narimatsu
D000328:Adult; D000410:Alanine Transaminase / Q000097:blood*; D054459:Elasticity Imaging Techniques; D005260:Female; D006515:Hepatitis B virus / Q000472:pathogenicity; D019694:Hepatitis B, Chronic / Q000150:complications* / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D006801:Humans; D037102:Lectins / Q000097:blood*; D008103:Liver Cirrhosis / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012372:ROC Curve; D012016:Reference Values; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity
D037102:Lectins; D000410:Alanine Transaminase