Liver fibrosis evaluation by ARFI and APRI in chronic hepatitis C

AIM: To explore the value of liver fibrosis assessment by acoustic radiation force impulse (ARFI) and the AST/PLT ratio index (APRI) in chronic hepatitis C patients. METHODS: One hundred and twenty eight patients with chronic hepatitis C were examined using ARFI elastometry and APRI, calculated according to known formulae. The gold standard of liver biopsy was referred; ROC curve analysis was used to assess all ARFI and APRI values. The corresponding cut-off values, sensitivities, and specificities were calculated and compared. In addition, the correlation of liver fibrosis stages in chronic hepatitis C patients with ARFI measurements and APRI were also tested to evaluate significant data. RESULTS: The values of ARFI in S1-S4 were 1.23 +/- 0.34 m/s, 1.48 +/- 0.43 m/s, 2.06 +/- 0.45 m/s, and 2.30 +/- 0.87 m/s. The values of APRI in S1-S4 were 0.31 +/- 0.45 m/s, 0.28 +/- 0.38 m/s, 0.58 +/- 0.59 m/s and 0.65 +/- 0.34 m/s. ARFI (r = 0.649, P < 0.05) showed a better correlation with liver fibrosis stages in chronic hepatitis C than APRI (r = 0.478, P < 0.05). The areas under the ROC curves for ARFI and APRI were 0.775 and 0.721 for stages >= S2, 0.901 and 0.787 for stages >= S3, and 0.792 and 0.780 for S = 4, respectively. CONCLUSION: Both ARFI and APRI could evaluate liver fibrosis stages in chronic hepatitis C. ARFI is more accurate than the APRI index. (C) 2014 Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.