Detecting Liver Fibrosis by Recent Reliable Biomarkers in Viral Hepatitis Patients

Abstract

Abstract Objectives By far, chronic viral hepatitis and its complications have been considered a fatal health public issue. Liver biopsy has a pivotal role to distinguish patients who need proper care and regular screening. The correlation between alternative biomarkers and liver fibrosis has been studied by current research to avoid histopathology techniques. Methods Several biomarkers such as COLL-IV, COMP, and hyaluronic acid besides scoring systems (FIB-4, APRI, NAFLD, and SHASTA) were measured and calculated in 143 infected cases with HCV and HBV. Also, the same parameters were determined in 75 healthy persons as controls. The Metavir system was used to classify infected cases from F0 to F4. Alternative marker levels were determined by using the ELISA technique. HBV DNA and HCV RNA were quantified by implementing the RT-PCR assay. Noninvasive markers were approved by comparison with the mentioned scoring indexes. Results Our research has indicated that hyaluronic acid, COMP, Coll-IV, and scoring indexes of fibrosis discriminate fibrosis cases from the nonfibrosis group. The studied biomarkers have high sensitivity from 77.05% to 96.72% and accuracy from 89.71% to 97.79% as well as their cutoff, which approved the aim of this study. Thereafter, the studied markers’ reports assisted in differentiating primary stages F1+F2 from late levels F3+F4 of fibrosis. Conclusions According to reports of the current study, serum markers including HA and CO-IV have performed better than biopsy in excluding advanced fibrosis from mild fibrosis patients comfortably as well as differentiating fibrosis patients from healthy individuals, while the COMP test has low accuracy and needs further research. Scoring systems alone are likely not sufficiently sensitive to rule out significant disease. Hence, gathering serological markers and scoring indexes are being perfected to determine all stages of fibrosis definitely. However, further research is needed to prove reliable noninvasive markers of liver fibrosis.