Aims. To determine the usefulness of platelet count (PC), spleen diameter (SD) and platelet count/spleen diameter ratio (PC/SD ratio) for the prediction of oesophageal varices (OV) and large OV in black African patients with cirrhosis in Côte d'Ivoire. Materials and Methods. Study was conducted in a training sample (111 patients) and in a validation sample (91 patients). Results. Factors predicting OV were sex: (OR = 0.08, P = 0.0003), PC (OR = 12.4, P = 0.0003), SD (OR = 1.04, P = 0.002) in the training sample. The AUROCs (±SE) of the model (cutoff ≥ 0.6), PC (cutoff < 110500), SD (cutoff > 140) and PC/SD ratio (cutoff ≤ 868) were, respectively; 0.879 ± 0.04, 0.768 ± 0.06, 0.679 ± 0.06, 0.793 ± 0.06. For the prediction of large OV, the model's AUROC (0.850 ± 0.05) was superior to that of PC (0.688 ± 0.06), SD (0.732 ± 0.05) and PC/SD ratio (0.752 ± 0.06). In the validation sample, with PC, PC/SD ratio and the model, upper digestive endoscopy could be obviated respectively in 45.1, 45.1, and 44% of cirrhotic patients. Prophylactic treatment with beta blockers could be started undoubtedly respectively in 36.3, 41.8 and 28.6% of them as having large OV. Conclusion. Non-invasive means could be used to monitor cirrhotic patients and consider treatment in African regions lacking endoscopic facilities.

Contradictory results of the accuracy of bio-chemical markers to predict the stage of fibrosis in black African patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB) were previously published. We con-ducted a prospective cohort study to determine the diagnostic accuracy of aspartate ami-notransferase to platelet ratio (APRI), aspartate aminotransferase to alanine aminotransferase ratio (AAR), platelet count, age-platelet (AP) in-dex, and FIB-4 index for the prediction of sig-nificant fibrosis or cirrhosis in 117 black African patients (median age: 38 years, males: 73 %) with CHB not previously treated. Among them, 45 had significant fibrosis and 18 had cirrhosis using the METAVIR score system. Factors as-sociated either with significant fibrosis or cir-rhosis were determined in logistic multivariate analysis. Areas under receiver operating curve were assessed and compared for APRI, AAR, AP index, FIB-4 index and platelet count. Sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values were determined for each biochemical markers. Multivariate analysis showed that as-partate aminotransferase (p<0.0001) and plate-lets (p=0.03) were the independent factors as-sociated with significant fibrosis and only platelets (p=0.01) were associated with cirrhosis. APRI (cut-off > 1.1) and FIB-4 index (cut-off > 2.1) ruled out significant fibrosis with high specific-ity of 84.7 % and 86.1 % respectively and nega-tive predictive values of 78.2 % and 72.9 % re-spectively. More accurately, APRI (cut-off > 0.63) or FIB-4 index (cut-off > 1.26) ruled out cirrhosis with high sensitivity of 94.4% and 88.9% and high negative predictive values of 98.1% and 96.3% respectively. In conclusion, APRI and FIB-4 index are simple readily available markers to exclude significant fibrosis or more accu-rately cirrhosis in black African patients with CHB

BackgroundSystemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) and model for end-stage liver disease (MELD) predict short-term mortality in patients with cirrhosis. Prediction of mortality at initial hospitalization is unknown in black African patients with decompensated cirrhosis.AimThis study aimed to look at the role of MELD score and SIRS as the predictors of morbidity and mortality at initial hospitalization.Patients and methodsIn this retrospective cohort study, we enrolled 159 patients with cirrhosis (median age: 49 years, 70.4% males). The role of Child–Pugh–Turcotte (CPT) score, MELD score, and SIRS on mortality was determined by the Kaplan–Meier method, and the prognosis factors were assessed with Cox regression model.ResultsAt initial hospitalization, 74.2%, 20.1%, and 37.7% of the patients with cirrhosis showed the presence of ascites, hepatorenal syndrome, and esophageal varices, respectively. During the in-hospital follow-up, 40 (25.2%) patients died. The overall incidence of mortality was found to be 3.1 [95% confidence interval (CI): 2.2–4.1] per 100 person-days. Survival probabilities were found to be high in case of patients who were SIRS negative (log-rank test= 4.51, p=0.03) and in case of patients with MELD score ≤16 (log-rank test=7.26, p=0.01) compared to the patients who were SIRS positive and those with MELD score >16. Only SIRS (hazard ratio (HR)=3.02, [95% CI: 1.4–7.4], p=0.01) and MELD score >16 (HR=2.2, [95% CI: 1.1–4.3], p=0.02) were independent predictors of mortality in multivariate analysis except CPT, which was not relevant in our study. Patients with MELD score >16 experienced hepatorenal syndrome (p=0.002) and encephalopathy (p=0.001) more frequently than that of patients with MELD score ≤16. SIRS was not useful in predicting complications.ConclusionMELD score and SIRS can be used as tools for the prediction of mortality in black African patients with decompensated cirrhosis.

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