INTRODUCTION Hepatic dysfunction is a common finding in critically ill patients on the ICU and directly influences survival. Liver stiffness can be measured by the novel method of transient elastography (fibroscan) and is closely associated with hepatic fibrosis in patients with chronic liver disease, but also is increased in patients with acute hepatitis, acute liver failure and cholestasis. W...

PURPOSE To determine normal liver stiffness values evaluated with magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) in healthy normal Asian volunteers and assess its reproducibility. MATERIALS AND METHODS Liver stiffness was evaluated with MRE in 41 healthy Asians (23 females, 18 males; mean age, 41.8 years, and mean body mass index [BMI], 23.4 kg/m(2) ) on a 1.5T clinical scanner. The correlations betwe...

BACKGROUND Measuring liver stiffness is becoming more popular as a non-invasive tool for assessing liver fibrosis. AIM To assess the effect of severe hepatitis B flare on liver stiffness and determine factors that correlate with liver stiffness measurements. METHODS Twenty-nine patients with severe hepatitis B flare (ALT > 10 × upper limit of normal) were followed up for 1 year. Serial tran...

Background: Transient Elastography (TE) is a noninvasive, reproducible tool to assess liver stiffness. Previous systemic review showed that liver stiffness measured by TE has high accuracy to detect histological liver fibrosis. However, few studies are looking at this relationship in patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB). We aimed to assess the correlation between liver stiffness and liver fi...

BACKGROUND To assess correlation between liver or spleen stiffness measurement by transient elastography (TE) and hepatic venous pressure gradient (HVPG) in patients with chronic liver disease as well find optimal and rule in/rule out cut-offs for prognosis of clinically significant (CSPH) and severe (SPH) portal hypertension. METHODS In this prospective study patients with different chronic ...

OBJECTIVES Soluble receptor for advanced glycation end products (sRAGE) has emerged as a possible biomarker of several disease conditions, including liver injury. This study was aimed to assess serum sRAGE and liver stiffness in biliary atresia (BA). DESIGN AND METHODS Forty postoperative BA patients and 20 controls were enrolled. Serum sRAGE levels were analyzed by enzyme-linked immunosorben...

Liver fibrosis, the response to chronic liver injury, results from the activation of mesenchymal cells to fibrogenic myofibroblasts. We have recently shown that two key myofibroblast precursor populations, hepatic stellate cells and portal fibroblasts, undergo activation in culture in response to increasing substrate stiffness. We therefore hypothesized that alterations in liver stiffness prece...

BACKGROUND For patients with chronic liver disease, different optimal liver stiffness cut-off values correspond to different stages of fibrosis, which are specific for the underlying liver disease and population. AIMS To establish the normal ranges of liver stiffness in the healthy Chinese population without underlying liver disease. METHODS This is a prospective cross sectional study of 2,...

AIM To investigate serum urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor (uPAR) and liver stiffness in biliary atresia (BA) and examine the correlation of circulating uPAR, liver stiffness, and clinical outcomes in postoperative BA children. METHODS Eighty-five postKasai BA children and 24 control subjects were registered. Circulating uPAR was measured using enzyme-linked immunosorbent essay. L...

AIM To investigate changes in hepatic and splenic stiffness in patients without chronic liver disease during liver resection for hepatic tumors. METHODS Patients scheduled for liver resection for hepatic tumors were considered for enrollment. Tissue stiffness measurements on liver and spleen were conducted before and two days after liver resection using point shear-wave elastography. Histolog...