Risk factors for liver cirrhosis in acute-on-chronic liver failure patients without liver cirrhosis in the convalescence stage / 临床肝胆病杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the risk factors for liver cirrhosis after hepatocyte necrosis in acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) patients without liver cirrhosis in the convalescence stage. Methods A retrospective analysis was performed for the clinical data of ACLF patients who were treated in Beijing YouAn Hospital, Capital Medical University, from January 2015 to June 2019. A total of 57 ACLF patients without liver cirrhosis who had a survival time of > 48 weeks and complete clinical data were enrolled, and according to the presence or absence of liver cirrhosis at week 48 of follow-up, they were divided into non-cirrhosis group and cirrhosis group. The two groups were compared in terms of clinical indices, noninvasive liver fibrosis scores, and prognostic scores to screen out independent influencing factors for progression to liver cirrhosis. The t -test was used for comparison of normally distributed continuous data between two groups, and the Mann-Whitney U test was used for comparison of non-normally distributed continuous data between two groups; the chi-square test or the Fisher's exact test was used for comparison of categorical data between two groups. Univariate and multivariate logistic analyses were used to investigate the risk factors for progression to liver cirrhosis within 48 weeks, and the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was used to evaluate the predictive efficiency of independent risk factors. Results Among the 57 patients, 9(15.8%) developed liver cirrhosis within 4 weeks of follow-up and showed disappearance of liver cirrhosis at week 48 of follow-up; at week 48 of follow-up, 26 patients (45.6%) developed liver cirrhosis, and the patients were divided into non-cirrhosis group with 31 patients and cirrhosis group with 26 patients. Compared with the non-cirrhosis group, the cirrhosis group had significantly lower levels of cholinesterase (ChE) (2844.32±961.05 U/L vs 4137.59±1604.83 U/L, t =3.177, P =0.003) and platelet count (PLT) [(100.04±57.28)×10 9 /L vs (138.84±56.46)×10 9 /L, t =2.564, P =0.013] and a significantly higher fibrosis-4 score [7.81 (3.92-11.36) vs 4.45 (2.14-7.80), Z =258.0, P =0.030]. The above indices were included in the univariate and multivariate logistic analyses, and the results showed that low levels of ChE (odds ratio [ OR ]=1.001, 95% confidence interval [ CI ] 1.000-1.002, P =0.010) and PLT( OR =1.015, 95% CI 1.002-1.028, P =0.027) were independent risk factors for liver cirrhosis in ACLF patients without liver cirrhosis in the convalescence stage. The ROC curve analysis showed that the combination of ChE and PLT had a greater value in predicting the onset of liver cirrhosis in ACLF patients without liver cirrhosis in the convalescence stage. Conclusion Low levels of ChE and PLT are independent risk factors for liver cirrhosis in ACLF patients without liver cirrhosis in the convalescence stage, and the combination of ChE and PLT has certain advantages.