Correlation of biological serum markers with the degree of hepatic fibrosis and necroinflammatory activity in hepatitis C and schistosomiasis patients

• Autor(a) principal: Morais,Clarice Neuenschwander Lins de
• Data de Publicação: 2010
• Outros Autores: Carvalho,Bruno de Melo, Melo,Wlademir Gomes de, Melo,Fábio Lopes de, Lopes,Edmundo Pessoa de Almeida, Domingues,Ana Lúcia Coutinho, Jucá,Norma, Martins,João Roberto Maciel, Diniz,George Tadeu Nunes, Montenegro,Silvia Maria Lucena
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Memórias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz
• Texto Completo: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0074-02762010000400018
• topic: biological markers; hepatic fibrosis; HC; schistosomiasis

Liver biopsy is the gold-standard method to stage fibrosis; however, it is an invasive procedure and is potentially dangerous. The main objective of this study was to evaluate biological markers, such as cytokines IL-13, IFN-γ, TNF-α and TGF-β, platelets, bilirubins (Bil), alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST), total proteins, γ-glutamil transferase (γ-GT) and alkaline phosphatase (AP), that could be used to predict the severity of hepatic fibrosis in schistosomiasis and hepatitis C (HC) as isolated diseases or co-infections. The following patient groups were selected: HC (n = 39), HC/hepatosplenic schistosomiasis (HSS) (n = 19), HSS (n = 22) and a control group (n = 13). ANOVA and ROC curves were used for statistical analysis. P < 0.05 was considered significant. With HC patients we showed that TNF-α (p = 0.020) and AP (p = 0.005) could differentiate mild and severe fibrosis. With regard to necroinflammatory activity, AST (p = 0.002), γ-GT (p = 0.034) and AP (p = 0.001) were the best markers to differentiate mild and severe activity. In HC + HSS patients, total Bil (p = 0.008) was capable of differentiating between mild and severe fibrosis. In conclusion, our study was able to suggest biological markers that are non-invasive candidates to evaluate fibrosis and necroinflammatory activity in HC and HC + HSS.