Evaluation of liver fibrosis and carotid intima-media thickness index (C-IMT) in patients with chronic hepatitis C virus before and after direct-acting antiviral treatment (DAA)

Abstract

Introduction. Viral hepatitis is still a challenge for the medical world and research over the past decades has been aimed at discovering viable methods of prevention, diagnosis and treatment. Material and methods. Data analysed from 73 patients from ”Dr. Victor Babes” Clinical Hospital of Infectious and Tropical Diseases and ”Dr. Victor Babes” Private Medical Clinic, both from Bucharest. Results. Fibroscan assessment showed that patients predominantly have F2, F3, F4 Metavir fibrosis stage while FibroTest showed F3, F4 stage of fibrosis. It was observed a decrease in fibrosis stage after DAA treatment comparative to values before treatment (5.622 kPa average post-treatment comparative to 11.49 kPa before treatment, statistically significant with p value < 0.001). Chronic infection with hepatitis C virus is considered a risk factor for atherosclerosis correlated with a higher cardiovascular risk compared to the general population. Monitoring patients prior to and after DAA treatment is an efficient method to detect early vascular changes that could lead to thrombotic and/or cardiovascular events. Conclusions. Measurement of the IMT index by doppler ultrasound in patients with hepatitis C virus infectionmay constitute a method of identification the endothelial dysfunction or atherosclerosis and may help to establish cardiovascular risk. Elimination of hepatitis C virus is the target of ongoing international programmes but the extrahepatic effects of persistent infection, early diagnosis and appropriate treatment should not be neglected.

Keywords

• hepatitis virus c
• imt
• cardiovascular
• extrahepatic
• daa