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Evaluation of Baveno VII Criteria in Ruling out High Risk Varices in Cirrhotic Egyptian Patients


Badawy A. Abdulaziz
Magdy AbdelMawgoud Gad
Ahmed Mohamed Edrees
Ahmed Esmat ElAshry
Ahmed S. Elgazar

Abstract

Background: Most serious complications of liver cirrhosis, including ascites, esophageal varices (EV), and variceal hemorrhage, are  brought on by portal hypertension. It has been suggested that screening with a gastroscopy be used to evaluate EV and bleeding risk in  patients with cirrhosis. Gastroscopy, however, is a costly and intrusive surgery that carries some risk. Esophageal varices and high-risk  varices have been identified or ruled out using noninvasive screening techniques such as liver and spleen stiffness.


Objective: Our goal was to confirm that, in Egyptian cirrhotic individuals, spleen stiffness, liver stiffness, and platelet count (PLT) can be used to rule out high-risk varices.


Subjects and Methods: A total of 155 individuals with liver cirrhosis were included in cross-sectional study based on whether they had  esophageal varices or not using esophagogastroduodenoscopy. The patients were sorted into three distinct groups according to the  degree of varices: Those without varices, those with low-risk varices, and those with high-risk varices.


Results: It was observed that the high-risk varices group had greater liver and spleen stiffness measurements than the no varices and  low risk varices groups. Spleen stiffness at a cut-off level of < 45 kpa is optimum in ruling out high risk varices (HRV) with 93.85%  sensitivity, 96.67% specificity 95.3% PPV and 95.6% NPV with P value <0.001 and AUC of 0.981, while liver stiffness for ruling out HRV, the  optimum cut-off level was < 29.1 kpa with 71.11% sensitivity, 95.38% specificity, 95.52% PPV and 70.45% NPV with P value <0.001 and AUC  of 0.886. Platelets at a cut-off level <93 can rule out HRV with 84.44% sensitivity, 96.92% specificity, 97.44% PPV and 81.82% NPV with P  value <0.001 and AUC=0.898.


Conclusions: In Egyptian cirrhotic individuals, spleen stiffness in addition to liver stiffness and PLT may be  helpful in ruling out high-risk varices, which is consistent with the Baveno VII criteria. 


Journal Identifiers


eISSN: 2090-7125
print ISSN: 1687-2002