Diagnosis of liver fibrosis in patients with hepatitis B-related liver disease using ultrasound with wave-number domain attenuation coefficient

• Published in: The Turkish journal of gastroenterology 2020-12, Vol.31 (12), p.923-929
• Main Authors: He, Danqing, Zhang, Chaoxue, Qiu, Wenqian, Xie, Qinxiu
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Complications and side effects; Diagnosis; Diagnosis, Ultrasonic; Fibrosis; Hepatitis B; Methods; Original : Liver
• ISSN: 2148-5607; 1300-4948; 2148-5607
• DOI: 10.5152/tjg.2020.20139

The importance of identifying the stage of liver fibrosis has motivated the development of non-invasive methods. This study aimed to evaluate the applicability of ultrasound analysis involving the wave-number domain attenuation coefficient (W-Ac) in the non-invasive quantitative differentiation of liver fibrosis. This was a prospective study of inpatients with hepatitis B-related liver disease treated between October 2016 and January 2018. In ultrasound, the echo from the near-field liver tissue was selected as the reference signal. The W-Ac of liver tissues was based on the fast Fourier transform of the acquired post-beamforming radio frequency signals. These values were compared with fibrosis from biopsy METAVIR score results. A receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve tested the W-Ac method. A total of 46 patients were enrolled, including 27 males and 19 females. Fibrosis was stage F0 in 12 patients, F1 in 13 patients, F2 in 10 patients, F3 in 7 patients, and F4 in 4 patients. W-Ac increased with the progression of liver fibrosis up to stage F3. There were differences between F0 and F4 stages (p