Clinical value of Virtual Touch Tissue Quantification for evaluating early alcoholic liver cirrhosis

Objective To investigate the diagnostic value of virtual touch tissue quantification (VTQ) technique for early alcoholic liver cirrhosis. Methods The right lobes of liver of 154 people in three groups (63 patients with alcoholic liver disease,41 patients with early liver alcoholic cirrhosis and 50 healthy controls) were checked and recorded by VTQ technique.One week later,all the patients underwent liver biopsy.The pathological examination result was used as the gold standard to evaluate the diagnostic value of VTQ technique for early alcoholic liver cirrhosis.The cut-off value was determined by an analysis of receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC). Results The average velocity of VTQ was (1.14±0.14) m/s,(1.48±0.27) m/s,(2.33±0.48) m/s in control,ALD and early alcoholic liver cirrhosis group,respectively.Significant difference were found among these three groups (P<0.001).The area under the ROC curve was 0.955 by using the VTQ technique in the assessment of early alcoholic liver cirrhosis.The VTQ value of 1.78 m/s was used as cut-off value to distinguish between ALD and early liver cirrhosis.The sensitivity (Se) and specificity (Sp) to diagnose early cirrhosis was 85.7% and 95.1%. Conclusion VTQ technique can quantitatively reflect liver tissue stiffness information,which has high value to diagnose early alcoholic liver cirrhosis.