Arya S, Dixit R, Harish C S, Prakash A, Puri AS. Our experience with liver and spleen elastography in the prediction of oesophageal varices.
SA J Radiol 2024;
28:2724. [PMID:
38323244 PMCID:
PMC10839201 DOI:
10.4102/sajr.v28i1.2724]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/27/2023] [Accepted: 11/16/2023] [Indexed: 02/08/2024] Open
Abstract
Background
Variceal bleeding is an important cause of mortality in patients with chronic liver disease (CLD). The gold standard for detection and grading of oesophageal varices (EV) is upper gastrointestinal endoscopy. However, it is expensive, time-consuming and invasive.
Objectives
This study aimed to find any association between splenic shear wave velocity (SWV) measured by acoustic radiation force imaging (ARFI) and the presence of EV.
Method
The quasi-experimental study included 50 patients with CLD and 50 subjects without CLD as the control group. Both underwent upper abdominal ultrasonography followed by elastographic assessment on a Siemens Acuson S2000TM ultrasound system. A comparison of the findings was made between the control and patient groups.
Results
Both groups had similar hepatic size while patients with CLD had larger splenic size and area (p < 0.05). The CLD patients had higher mean hepatic and splenic SWV compared with the control group (p < 0.05). The mean splenic size and splenic SWV were higher in patients with varices than in those without varices (p < 0.05).
Conclusion
Chronic liver disease causes significant increase in liver and splenic stiffness with splenic SWV values being higher for patients with varices emphasising the role of elastography as a non-invasive predictor for the presence of EVs. Splenic SWV had the highest sensitivity and specificity, which was augmented by a combination of hepatic and splenic SWV. Thus, splenic SWV alone or in combination with hepatic SWV is a useful technique for prediction of the presence of EVs.
Contribution
This study aims to find an alternative non-invasive and cost-effective technique for screening of EV.
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