Diagnostic Value of the Glasgow-Blatchford Scoring System in Patients With Upper Gastrointestinal Bleeding

Abstract

There are disagreements about the diagnostic value of the current risk stratification systems in patients with acute upper gastrointestinal bleeding (UGIB). The present study aimed to determine the diagnostic value of the Glasgow-Blatchford score in UGIB patients. This study was conducted on 182 patients with UGIB who underwent endoscopy in the Emergency Department of Imam Reza Hospital, Mashhad, Iran. Glasgow-Blatchford Score (GBS) of each patient was estimated by using the clinical and laboratory parameters. The relationship between Blatchford score and endoscopic findings was assessed. Additionally, the sensitivity and specificity of GBS were measured based on high- and low-risk patients. According to the results, GBS had a high sensitivity (90.9%), specificity (79%), as well as positive (76%), and negative predictive values (92.2%). However, no significant relationship was observed between the Glasgow-Blatchford score and re-bleeding. As the findings of the present study indicated, Glasgow-Blatchford was a good predictive method for the determination of the high-risk and low-risk patients with UGIB. Nevertheless, this method showed poor performance in the prediction of re-bleeding.

Keywords

• Upper gastrointestinal bleeding
• Endoscopy
• Glasgow-Blatchford score