ABSTRACT
Background: Hepatitis C is a leading cause of liver fibrosis, cirrhosis, and cirrhosis associated complications. In this study, we compared readily available non-invasive fibrosis indexes with fibro scans for fibrosis staging and predicting its progression in Pakistani population. Methods: The retro prospective cross-sectional study was conducted in medicine unit 1 and 2 and hepatitis clinic of Lahore General Hospital, Lahore starting from February 12, 2018 to January 8, 2019. We studied 1464 HCV infected patients which were got CBC, LFTs, ELISA, PCR and fibro scan was done to perfectly diagnose ongoing hepatitis C infection. In order to differentiate HCV fibrosis progression, we compared the effectiveness of readily available AST to Platelet Index (APRI), and FIB-4 with fibro scan. Results: Readily available serum indexes AST to Platelet Index (APRI) and FIB-4 were able to stage liver fibrosis in advanced stages of fibrosis (F4 especially) with correlation coefficient indexes 0.462, and 0.131 with considerable specificities and sensitivities. For APRI >1.5, it did predict F4 stage with sensitivity of 87.6% and specificity of 74.8%. For Fib-4> 3.25, it did predict F4 stage with sensitivity of 72.3% and specificity of 53.2%. Conclusion: Readily available and cheap serum indexes, AST to Platelet Index (APRI) and FIB-4 accurately predicted distinguished between cirrhotic and non- cirrhotic stages in HCV infected patients in comparison to the costly and rarely available Fibro scan score.