Predictive Power of Share Wave Fibro Scan in HCC After HCV Infection

Liver fibrosis is common to all chronic liver disease (CLD) , With time, this progressive disruption of hepatic architecture can develop into cirrhosis, characterized by "diffuse conversion of normal liver architecture into structurally abnormal nodules", About1% to 4% of patients with HCV-induced liver cirrhosis are diagnosed with HCC each year .

The historical gold standard for quantifying fibrosis is liver biopsy, but its invasive nature and potential for complications make it unpopular among patients and impractical for serial assessments of CLD. Furthermore, since histological lesions are not uniformly distributed across the liver parenchyma, this allows for large sampling error. The need for credible alternatives to biopsy has stimulated research into non-invasive methods of fibrosis assessment, including serum biomarkers , axial imaging and transient elastography.

FibroScan™ (Echosens, Paris, France) allows a non-invasive liver stiffness measurement (LSM), it is a relatively simple, highly reproducible and operator independent technique which examines an area 100 times that of a biopsy, reducing sampling bias , Shear wave elastography (SWE) measures LS by quantifying the velocity of shear waves produced in the liver tissue and uses a normal B-mode ultrasound probe for measuring LS in real time. In addition, SWE imaging using the Aixplorer system provides a high frame-rate and may be able to provide more accurate scoring of fibrosis .