Introduction

Cirrhosis is a chronic liver disorder characterized by fibrosis, leading to liver dysfunction and portal hypertension. Ferritin has emerged as a simple biomarker associated with prognosis in cirrhotic patients. Our study aimed to determine the presence of a significant relationship between serum ferritin levels and the incidence of complications.

Aims & Methods

In this retrospective descriptive and analytic study, serum ferritin levels were assessed in adult cirrhotic patients upon admission to our Hepato-Gastroenterology department at a University Hospital between March 2017 and March 2023. Subsequently, patients were evaluated for the occurrence of complications within the following year. Serum ferritin levels normal range were of 22 to 275 ng/ml for men and 4.63 to 204 ng/ml for women.

Results

Our study comprised 140 cirrhotic patients with varied etiologies, including 72 females and 68 males, with an average age of 58 ± 14.88 years (range: 21 to 90). These patients presented with varying disease stages and diverse etiologies.
Among patients with elevated ferritin levels, 86.4% experienced complication within the year following the measurement, compared to only 43.8% of patients with normal ferritin levels. The most commonly observed complication was hepatic encephalopathy, followed by variceal bleeding, and ascites. Our findings suggest a significant association between serum ferritin levels and the occurrence of complications within the subsequent year (p< 0.001).
These patients were distributed across different disease stages: 50 had Child-Pugh score A, 66 had Child-Pugh score B, and 24 had Child-Pugh score C. We used the Anova test to compare the average ferritin levels among the three groups. we found a significant difference between ferritin values in the 3 groups: A (88.27 ± 152), B (528 ± 1209), C (105 ± 128) (p: 0.027). And by using post Hoc tests, we found that this difference was significant between group A and B (p: 0.04), but non significant difference between A and C, and B and C.

Conclusion

In conclusion, our study reveals a significant association between elevated serum ferritin levels and increased incidence of complications in cirrhotic patients, highlighting ferritin as a potential prognostic marker for disease progression.

References

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1521691811000357?via%3Dihub
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6687222/