Non-invasive assessment of liver fibrosis in patients with alcoholic liver disease using acoustic radiation force impulse elastography

To investigate the diagnostic performance of the acoustic radiation force impulse (ARFI) elastography for the assessment of the liver fibrosis in alcoholic liver disease (ALD). We included 112 patients with ALD in whom liver biopsy, ARFI elastography, and aspartate-to-platelet ratio index (APRI) measurements were performed. ARFI elastography correlated significantly with histological fibrosis (r = 0.685, P < 0.001) in patients with ALD. The diagnostic accuracies expressed as areas under receiver operating characteristic (AUROC) curves for ARFI elastography and APRI were 0.846 and 0.763 for the diagnosis of significant fibrosis (S a parts per thousand yen 2), 0.875 and 0.688 for the diagnosis of severe fibrosis (S a parts per thousand yen 3), and 0.893 and 0.648 for the diagnosis of liver cirrhosis, respectively. The AUROC values of ARFI elastography were significantly better than those of APRI for predicting severe fibrosis (P = 0.02) and cirrhosis (P = 0.04). The optimum cutoff values for ARFI elastography were 1.33 m/s for S a parts per thousand yen 2, 1.40 m/s for S a parts per thousand yen 3, and 1.65 m/s for S = 4 in patients with elevated alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels; these decreased to 1.24 m/s for S a parts per thousand yen 2, 1.27 m/s for S a parts per thousand yen 3, and 1.41 m/s for S = 4 in patients with normal ALT. ARFI elastography is an acceptable method for predicting the severity of fibrosis in patients with ALD. ARFI elastography is influenced by elevated aminotransferase levels in ALD.