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. 2023 Sep 12;11(9):2518.
doi: 10.3390/biomedicines11092518.

The Efficacy of Anthropometric Indicators in Predicting Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease Using FibroScan® CAP Values among the Taiwanese Population

Meng-Szu Lee  1   2 , Eva Belingon Felipe-Dimog  1   3 , Jeng-Fu Yang  2 , Yi-Yu Chen  2 , Kuan-Ta Wu  2 , Hsiang-Ju Kuo  2 , Tzu-Chun Lin  4   5 , Chao-Ling Wang  2 , Meng-Hsuan Hsieh  2   5   6 , Chia-Yi Lin  2 , Batbold Batsaikhan  7 , Chi-Kung Ho  1   2 , Ming-Tsang Wu  1   8   9   10 , Chia-Yen Dai  2   5   6   11
Affiliations

The Efficacy of Anthropometric Indicators in Predicting Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease Using FibroScan® CAP Values among the Taiwanese Population

Meng-Szu Lee et al. Biomedicines. .

Abstract

The controlled attenuation parameter (CAP) measurement obtained from FibroScan® is a low-risk method of assessing fatty liver. This study investigated the association between the FibroScan® CAP values and nine anthropometric indicators, including the abdominal volume index (AVI), body fat percentage (BFP), body mass index (BMI), conicity index (CI), ponderal index (PI), relative fat mass (RFM), waist circumference (WC), waist-hip ratio (WHR), and waist-to-height ratio (WHtR), and risk of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (fatty liver). We analyzed the medical records of adult patients who had FibroScan® CAP results. CAP values <238 dB/m were coded as 0 (non- fatty liver) and ≥238 dB/m as 1 (fatty liver). An individual is considered to have class 1 obesity when their body mass index (BMI) ranges from 30 kg/m2 to 34.9 kg/m2. Class 2 obesity is defined by a BMI ranging from 35 kg/m2 to 39.9 kg/m2, while class 3 obesity is designated by a BMI of 40 kg/m2 or higher. Out of 1763 subjects, 908 (51.5%) had fatty liver. The BMI, WHtR, and PI were found to be more strongly correlated with the CAP by the cluster dendrogram with correlation coefficients of 0.58, 0.54, and 0.54, respectively (all p < 0.0001). We found that 28.3% of the individuals without obesity had fatty liver, and 28.2% of the individuals with obesity did not have fatty liver. The BMI, CI, and PI were significant predictors of fatty liver. The BMI, PI, and WHtR demonstrated better predictive ability, indicated by AUC values of 0.72, 0.68, and 0.68, respectively, a finding that was echoed in our cluster group analysis that showed interconnected clustering with the CAP. Therefore, of the nine anthropometric indicators we studied, the BMI, CI, PI, and WHtR were found to be more effective in predicting the CAP score, i.e., fatty liver.

Keywords: anthropometric indicators; controlled attenuation parameters; non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Flow chart of the patients in the present study.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Cluster dendrogram of anthropometric indicators and CAP values.
Figure 3
Figure 3
The relative ability of the nine anthropometric measurement values to predict non-alcoholic fatty liver assessed by AUC.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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