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Egy-Score accurately detected fibrosis, cirrhosis in HCV patients

Egy-Score was effective when measuring degrees of fibrosis and cirrhosis among Egyptian patients infected with chronic hepatitis C virus infection, according to data from a new study.

Mohamed Alboraie, MD, department of internal medicine, Al-Azhar University, Cairo, and colleagues studied 100 treatment-naive patients (mean age, 40.25 years; 67% men) with chronic hepatitis C virus infection (HCV) from the Kasr Al-Aini Viral Hepatitis Center, Cairo University, recruited between May 2011 and December 2012. Patients were analyzed for CA19-9, alpha-2-macroglobulin and total bilirubin and underwent abdominal ultrasound and liver biopsy.

Mohamed Alboraie

Hepatic fibrosis staging was calculated using the METAVIR scoring system (F0-F4), with F2 for significant fibrosis, F3 for hepatic fibrosis and F4 for cirrhosis. Egy-Score was determined by using the original formula: 3.52 plus 0.0063 by CA19-9 (U/mL) plus 0.0203 by age plus 0.4485 times alpha-2-macroglobulin (g/L) plus 0.0303 by bilirubin (mcmol/L) minus 0.0048 times platelet (K/mcL) minus 0.0462 times albumin (g/L).

Data indicated that Egy-Score positively correlated with all stages of fibrosis, as well as differentiating between hepatic fibrosis, severe hepatic fibrosis and cirrhosis (P<.001). Egy-Score also accurately measured sensitivity (75.8%), specificity (68.42%) and AUROC (0.776) for significant fibrosis, along with assessing severe fibrosis (91.67%, 77.63% and 0.875) and cirrhosis (81.82%, 86.52% and 0.874). Cut-off values for Egy-Score were 2.9185, 3.28624 and 3.6757 for F2, F3 and F4, respectively.

“Egy-Score showed good sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values and overall accuracy for detecting different stages of hepatic fibrosis and cirrhosis in patients with chronic hepatitis C,” the researchers wrote.