Association Between Carotid Intima-Media Thickness and Transaminitis in Patients with Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease

Abstract

Objectives: Carotid intima-media thickness (CIMT) is one of the subclinical markers for detection of cerebrovascular disease. CIMT can be measured through noninvasive carotid artery Doppler ultrasonography. It has been observed that average CIMT of Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD) patients are significantly high as compared to non-NAFLD patients which may lead to cerebrovascular complications in these patients. So, this study was conducted to compare CIMT in NAFLD with and without transaminitis.
Methods: This was a comparative cross sectional study, conducted in Mayo Hospital. 236 NAFLD patients were included in the study in accordance with a pre-defined inclusion and exclusion criteria. All the patients underwent abdominal ultrasonography for diagnosis of NAFLD & carotid doppler to measure CIMT. Liver
function tests were performed in all the patients and results of carotid intimal media thickness CIMT in NAFLD with and without deranged transaminases were compared.
Results: Mean age of the patients was 46.56 ± 11.60 years with 117(50%) female and 119(50%) male patients. Except Alkaline phosphates (p-value = 0.008), all other parameters of liver function test {ALT (pvalue=0.618), AST (p-value=0.551), Albumin (p-value=0.385) & Protein (p-value=0.823)} were statistically similar in patients whose CIMT was >0.8 and <0.8 mm. Among the patients whose CIMT was >0.8, 17(45.9%) patients had deranged liver function test. Similarly among those patients whose CIMT value was <0.8, 95(47.7%) patients had abnormal LFTs. Statistically speaking no significant association was seen between LFTs of patients and CIMT value (> 0.8 & <0.8) p-value= 0.841.
Conclusion: Thus it is concluded that there is no significant correlation between CIMT and transaminitis in NAFLD patients.