Galectin 3 and Transient Elastography as Noninvasive Methods to Assess Liver Fibrosis in Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease Patients

Abstract Background Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is a condition defined by excessive fat accumulation in the liver. It is one of the most common and emerging problems worldwide which is estimated to be approximately 20% -30% in the general population. The pathogenesis is multifactor, including dietary factors, insulin resistance, adipokines, innate and adaptive immunity. Aim of the Work To evaluate serum level of Galectin 3 and Transient Elastography as Noninvasive Methods to assess Liver Fibrosis in patient with Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease. Patients and Methods This was an observational prospective cross sectional study that was conducted on 150 patients with NAFLD, who had risk factors including hyperlipidemia, diabetes mellitus with NAFLD, who were attending or admitted to Hepatology unit, Ain Shams University Hospital and Bani Suef General Hospital. In this study, diagnosis was based on abdominal ultrasonic findings including increased echogenicity, loss of definition of the diaphragm, and blurring of vascular margins. This work was carried out in accordance with the World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki. An informed written consent was obtained from the patients before enrollment in the study. The consent was taken in a separate room to ensure confidentiality. The study sought approval from the Ethics Review Committee of the Faculty of Medicine, Ain Shams University by written consent. Results In our study we found that there no statistically significant difference between studied groups regarding BMI. In our study we found that regarding comorbidities, there was no statistically significant difference between the studied groups according to hypertension while there was statistically significant difference according to DM with higher prevalence among NAFL group. In our study we found that regarding lipid profile between the studied groups, there was high statistically significant difference between the studied groups regarding cholesterol and TAG. Conclusion We revealed that there was highly statistically significant difference between the studied groups regarding cholesterol, TAG AST, ALT, serum creatine hemoglobin and platelet. Also, we found that non-invasive elastography is beneficial in the diagnosis and assessment of NAFLD when compared to the gold standard, transient hepatic elastography presented the best performance for the diagnosis and exclusion of advanced fibrosis in patients with NAFLD.