Procalcitonin Identifies Cell Injury, Not Bacterial Infection, in Acute Liver Failure

Background Because acute liver failure (ALF) patients share many clinical features with severe sepsis and septic shock, identifying bacterial infection clinically in ALF patients is challenging. Procalcitonin (PCT) has proven to be a useful marker in detecting bacterial infection. We sought to determine whether PCT discriminated between presence and absence of infection in patients with ALF. Method Retrospective analysis of data and samples of 115 ALF patients from the United States Acute Liver Failure Study Group randomly selected from 1863 patients were classified for disease severity and ALF etiology. Twenty uninfected chronic liver disease (CLD) subjects served as controls. Results Procalcitonin concentrations in most samples were elevated, with median values for all ALF groups near or above a 2.0 ng/mL cut-off that generally indicates severe sepsis. While PCT concentrations increased somewhat with apparent liver injury severity, there were no differences in PCT levels between the pre-defined severity groups–non-SIRS and SIRS groups with no documented infections and Severe Sepsis and Septic Shock groups with documented infections, (p = 0.169). PCT values from CLD patients differed from all ALF groups (median CLD PCT value 0.104 ng/mL, (p ≤0.001)). Subjects with acetaminophen (APAP) toxicity, many without evidence of infection, demonstrated median PCT \u3e2.0 ng/mL, regardless of SIRS features, while some culture positive subjects had PCT values Summary/Conclusions While PCT appears to be a robust assay for detecting bacterial infection in the general population, there was poor discrimination between ALF patients with or without bacterial infection presumably because of the massive inflammation observed. Severe hepatocyte necrosis with inflammation results in elevated PCT levels, rendering this biomarker unreliable in the ALF setting

Development and Pilot of a Checklist for Management of Acute Liver Failure in the Intensive Care Unit

Introduction Acute liver failure (ALF) is an ideal condition for use of a checklist. Our aims were to develop a checklist for the management of ALF in the intensive care unit (ICU) and assess the usability of the checklist among multiple providers. Methods The initial checklist was developed from published guidelines and expert opinion. The checklist underwent pilot testing at 11 academic liver transplant centers in the US and Canada. An anonymous, written survey was used to assess the usability and quality of the checklist. Written comments were used to improve the checklist following the pilot testing period. Results We received 81 surveys involving the management of 116 patients during the pilot testing period. The overall quality of the checklist was judged to be above average to excellent by 94% of users. On a 5-point Likert scale, the majority of survey respondents agreed or agreed strongly with the following checklist characteristics: the checklist was easy to read (99% agreed/agreed strongly), easy to use (97%), items are categorized logically (98%), time to complete the checklist did not interfere with delivery of appropriate and safe patient care (94%) and was not excessively burdensome (92%), the checklist allowed the user the freedom to use his or her clinical judgment (80%), it is a useful tool in the management of acute liver failure (98%). Web-based and mobile apps were developed for use of the checklist at the point of care. Conclusion The checklist for the management of ALF in the ICU was shown in this pilot study to be easy to use, helpful and accepted by a wide variety of practitioners at multiple sites in the US and Canada

Pattern of diagnostic evaluation for the causes of pediatric acute liver failure: an opportunity for quality improvement

Objective: To describe the frequency of diagnostic testing for the 4 most common causes of pediatric acute liver failure (PALF) (drugs, metabolic disease, autoimmune process, and infections) in indeterminate PALF within the PALF Study Group Database. Study design: PALF was defined by severe hepatic dysfunction within 8 weeks of onset of illness, with no known underlying chronic liver disease in patients from birth through 17 years of age. Results: Of the 703 patients in the database, 329 (47%) had indeterminate PALF. In this group, a drug history was obtained in 325 (99%) urine toxicology screenings performed in 118 (36%) and acetaminophen level measured in 124 (38%) patients. No testing for common metabolic diseases was done in 179 (54%) patients. Anti-nuclear antibody, anti-smooth muscle antibody, and anti-liver kidney microsomal autoantibodies associated with autoimmunity were determined in 239 (73%), 233 (71%), and 208 (63%) patients, and no tests were obtained in 70 (21%). Testing was performed for hepatitis A virus, hepatitis B virus, and Epstein Barr virus in 80%, 86%, and 68%, respectively. Conclusions: Current practice indicates that investigation for metabolic and autoimmune causes of PALF are infrequent in patients ultimately given a diagnosis of indeterminate acute liver failure. This offers an opportunity to improve diagnosis and potential treatment options in children with acute liver failure

Predicting outcome on admission and post-admission for acetaminophen-induced acute liver failure using classification and regression tree models.

Assessing prognosis for acetaminophen-induced acute liver failure (APAP-ALF) patients often presents significant challenges. King's College (KCC) has been validated on hospital admission, but little has been published on later phases of illness. We aimed to improve determinations of prognosis both at the time of and following admission for APAP-ALF using Classification and Regression Tree (CART) models.CART models were applied to US ALFSG registry data to predict 21-day death or liver transplant early (on admission) and post-admission (days 3-7) for 803 APAP-ALF patients enrolled 01/1998-09/2013. Accuracy in prediction of outcome (AC), sensitivity (SN), specificity (SP), and area under receiver-operating curve (AUROC) were compared between 3 models: KCC (INR, creatinine, coma grade, pH), CART analysis using only KCC variables (KCC-CART) and a CART model using new variables (NEW-CART).Traditional KCC yielded 69% AC, 90% SP, 27% SN, and 0.58 AUROC on admission, with similar performance post-admission. KCC-CART at admission offered predictive 66% AC, 65% SP, 67% SN, and 0.74 AUROC. Post-admission, KCC-CART had predictive 82% AC, 86% SP, 46% SN and 0.81 AUROC. NEW-CART models using MELD (Model for end stage liver disease), lactate and mechanical ventilation on admission yielded predictive 72% AC, 71% SP, 77% SN and AUROC 0.79. For later stages, NEW-CART (MELD, lactate, coma grade) offered predictive AC 86%, SP 91%, SN 46%, AUROC 0.73.CARTs offer simple prognostic models for APAP-ALF patients, which have higher AUROC and SN than KCC, with similar AC and negligibly worse SP. Admission and post-admission predictions were developed.• Prognostication in acetaminophen-induced acute liver failure (APAP-ALF) is challenging beyond admission • Little has been published regarding the use of King's College Criteria (KCC) beyond admission and KCC has shown limited sensitivity in subsequent studies • Classification and Regression Tree (CART) methodology allows the development of predictive models using binary splits and offers an intuitive method for predicting outcome, using processes familiar to clinicians • Data from the ALFSG registry suggested that CART prognosis models for the APAP population offer improved sensitivity and model performance over traditional regression-based KCC, while maintaining similar accuracy and negligibly worse specificity • KCC-CART models offered modest improvement over traditional KCC, with NEW-CART models performing better than KCC-CART particularly at late time points

Acetaminophen-induced Acute Liver Failure Is More Common and More Severe in Women

BACKGROUND & AIMS:Acetaminophen overdose is the leading cause of acute liver injury (ALI) and acute liver failure (ALF) in the developed world. Sex differences in acetaminophen-induced hepatotoxicity have not been described. METHODS:We collected data from the Acute Liver Failure Study Group cohort, a national registry of 32 academic medical centers in North America of adults with ALI or ALF, including 1162 patients with acetaminophen-induced ALI (n = 250) or acetaminophen-induced ALF (n = 912) from January 2000 through September 2016. We analyzed data on patient presentation, disease course, demographics, medical and psychiatric history, medication use, substance use, and details of acetaminophen ingestion. Sex differences in continuous and categorical variables were evaluated by Wilcoxon rank-sum and χ2 analysis or the Fisher exact test. Our primary aim was to evaluate sex differences in the presentation and clinical course of acetaminophen-induced acute liver injury or liver failure, and our secondary goal was to compare overall and transplant-free survival between sexes. RESULTS:Most patients with acetaminophen-induced ALI (68%) or ALF (76%) were women. Higher proportions of women than men had psychiatric disease (60% of women vs 48% of men, P < .01) and had co-ingestion with sedating agents (70% of women vs 52% of men, P < .01)-more than half of which were opioids. Higher proportions of women had severe hepatic encephalopathy (HE) (68% of women vs 58% of men), and required intubation (67% of women vs 59% of men, P values <.03). Higher proportions of women used vasopressors (26% of women vs 19% of men, P = .04) or mannitol (13% of women vs 6% of men, P < .01); proportions of male vs female patients with transplant-free survival were similar (68%). On adjusted analysis, women had higher risk of severe HE (adjusted odds ratio [AOR], 1.66; 95% CI, 1.17-2.35). We found a significant interaction between sex and co-ingestion of sedating agents (P < .01); co-ingestion increased odds of severe HE in women 2-fold (AOR, 1.86; 95% CI, 1.28-2.69; P < .01) but not in men (AOR; 0.62; 95% CI, 0.34-1.13; P = .12). CONCLUSIONS:In an analysis of the Acute Liver Failure Study Group cohort, we found acetaminophen-induced ALI and ALF to be more common among women. Women have greater critical care needs than men, and increased risk for severe HE, which could be due in part to increased use of sedatives. Future studies should investigate sex differences in acetaminophen metabolism and hepatotoxicity, particularly among users of opioids

Whole genome sequencing to identify host genetic risk factors for severe outcomes of hepatitis a virus infection

Acute liver failure is a severe, but rare, outcome of hepatitis A virus infection. Unusual presentations of prevalent infections have often been attributed to pathogen-specific immune deficits that exhibit Mendelian inheritance. Genome-wide resequencing of unrelated cases has proven to be a powerful approach for identifying highly penetrant risk alleles that underlie such syndromes. Rare mutations likely to affect protein expression or function can be identified from sequence data, and their association with a similarly rare phenotype rests on their existence in multiple affected individuals. A rare or novel sequence variant that is enriched to a significant degree in a genetically diverse cohort suggests a candidate susceptibility allele. Whole genome sequencing of ten individuals from ethnically diverse backgrounds with HAV-associated acute liver failure was performed. A set of rational filtering criteria was used to identify genetic variants that are rare in the population, but enriched in this cohort. Single nucleotide polymorphisms, insertions, and deletions were considered and autosomal dominant, autosomal recessive, and polygenic models were applied. Analysis of the protein-coding exome identified no single gene with putatively deleterious mutations shared by multiple individuals, arguing against a simple Mendelian model of inheritance. A number of rare variants were significantly enriched in this cohort, consistent with a complex and genetically heterogeneous trait. Several of the variants identified in this genome-wide study lie within genes important to hepatic pathophysiology and are candidate susceptibility alleles for hepatitis A virus infection

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A novel microRNA-based prognostic model outperforms standard prognostic models in patients with acetaminophen-induced acute liver failure.

BACKGROUND & AIMS: Acetaminophen (APAP)-induced acute liver failure (ALF) remains the most common cause of ALF in the Western world. Conventional prognostic models, utilising markers of liver injury and organ failure, lack sensitivity for mortality prediction. We previously identified a microRNA signature that is associated with successful regeneration post-auxiliary liver transplant and with recovery from APAP-ALF. Herein, we aimed to use this microRNA signature to develop outcome prediction models for APAP-ALF. METHODS: We undertook a nested, case-control study using serum samples from 194 patients with APAP-ALF enrolled in the US ALF Study Group registry (1998-2014) at early (day 1-2) and late (day 3-5) time-points. A microRNA qPCR panel of 22 microRNAs was utilised to assess microRNA expression at both time-points. Multiple logistic regression was used to develop models which were compared to conventional prognostic models using the DeLong method. RESULTS: Individual microRNAs confer limited prognostic value when utilised in isolation. However, incorporating them within microRNA-based outcome prediction models increases their clinical utility. Our early time-point model (AUC = 0.78, 95% CI 0.71-0.84) contained a microRNA signature associated with liver regeneration and our late time-point model (AUC = 0.83, 95% CI 0.76-0.89) contained a microRNA signature associated with cell-death. Both models were enhanced when combined with model for end-stage liver disease (MELD) score and vasopressor use and both outperformed the King\u27s College criteria. The early time-point model combined with clinical parameters outperformed the ALF Study Group prognostic index and the MELD score. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings demonstrate that a regeneration-linked microRNA signature combined with readily available clinical parameters can outperform existing prognostic models for ALF in identifying patients with poor prognosis who may benefit from transplantation. LAY SUMMARY: While acute liver failure can be reversible, some patients will die without a liver transplant. We show that blood test markers that measure the potential for liver recovery may help improve identification of patients unlikely to survive acute liver failure who may benefit from a liver transplant