LONDON, August 1, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --
According to official figures from the Department of Health,
alcoholic liver disease in the under 30s has risen by 50 per cent
in the last ten years.
Liver disease is now the country's fifth biggest killer. The
coalitiongovernment wants a "drink strategy" with input from both
the health lobby and the drinks industry.
Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics is helping patients suffering
from liver disease, with the launch of the first automated liver
fibrosis test - an important indicator of Chronic Liver
Disease.
Doctors in primary care are flooded with patients with obesity
and hazardous drinking, all of whom could be at risk of chronic
liver disease. The use of a simple blood test to accurately
identify those with significant liver disease will greatly aid
triage and the appropriate targeting of interventions including
weight loss, exercise, and therapeutic interventions.
Liver fibrosis refers to the accumulation of tough, fibrous scar
tissue in the liver. The formation of this tissue (through the
deposition of new collagen) is a normal bodily response to injury,
but in fibrosis this healing process goes awry.
The traditional reference standard for detecting and assessing
liver fibrosis has been trans-abdominal needle biopsy of the liver.
Small sample size and the patchy distribution of some liver
pathology can result in a significant degree of sampling error.
Also, the procedure can be painful and hazardous; bleeding is
caused in approximately one in 1000 cases and death in one in
10,000 cases. This also results in a high cost to the NHS with
patients requiring an overnight stay in hospital at a cost of
approximately £1,000.
This first fully automated standardised direct biomarker panel
offers doctors a quick, reliable, minimally invasive blood test
option to assess liver fibrosis - an important indicator of Chronic
Liver Disease (CLD) - with results in less than one hour.
With the addition of the ELF test, Siemens is currently the
only company to offer an integrated portfolio of diagnostic
solutions for managing liver health, which includes routine
chemistry tests, hepatitis serology tests, viral load testing, and
ultrasound systems.
Chronic liver disease, resulting from alcoholic liver disease,
fatty liver, or viral hepatitis, is increasingly recognised as a
major cause of morbidity and mortality. Standard liver function
tests do not accurately reflect the true extent of fibrotic damage
or, in many cases, may detect it too late.
Fibrosis is a common outcome in chronic liver disease, with
progression to cirrhosis accounting for thousands of deaths each
year. Liver biopsies are routinely performed to assess liver damage
(fibrosis) and to try to monitor the effectiveness of
pharmaceutical drugs in tackling the disease. Performing a liver
biopsy is a hazardous, expensive and painful experience for the
patient and does not always provide accurate results because of
difficulties in sampling and interpretation. Fibrosis is not evenly
distributed throughout the liver and because such a small amount of
biological material is sampled, 55 percent of 15mm biopsies may be
misclassified. Larger biopsies can be performed but even with 25mm
sections, 45 percent will be erroneous.
The discovery of the ELF markers represents a significant advance
in the diagnosis of patients with liver disease," said William Rosenberg, MBBS, D. Phil, Peter Scheuer
Chair in Liver Diseases and Joint Director of the Centre for
Hepatology at University College London. "Of particular
benefit, the ELF test can help to identify patients with
mild-to-moderate liver fibrosis, which is usually asymptomatic, so
that clinicians are able to intervene before significant damage to
the liver occurs."
"While liver biopsy is the standard for assessing liver
fibrosis, unfortunately, there are challenges with this procedure,
including patient discomfort and difficulties in interpreting the
results," explains Dave Hickey, CEO,
Chemistry, Immunoassay, Automation, and Diagnostics IT Business
Unit at Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics. "By offering an
automated, routine, minimally invasive blood test, Siemens provides
an additional tool to physicians to aid them to easily assess the
severity of liver fibrosis in their patients with chronic liver
disease."
The ELF test has been clinically validated on an Immuno-1 auto
analyser in an international multi-centre study with a mix of
patient groups, including viral hepatitis, non-alcoholic fatty
liver disease (NAFLD), and alcoholic patient groups.
Additionally, a 7-year follow-up study involving over 450
patients has shown that the ELF markers are at least comparable to
liver histology at predicting clinical outcomes of
CLD.[i]
For more information about the Siemens ELF Test, visit
http://www.siemens.com/ELF.
Notes to editor:
[i] Parkes et al., (2010)
"Enhanced Liver Fibrosis Test Can Predict Clinical Outcome in
Patients with Chronic Liver Disease," Gut (online
Aug 2010)
About Liver Fibrosis
Liver fibrosis is the scarring process that represents the
liver's response to injury or disease. In response to chronic
liver injury, stellate cells in the sinusoidal space are activated
and deposit a collagen matrix (fibrosis). Over time, the fibrosis
may become severe, leading to cirrhosis that may require a liver
transplant or result in death. The three biomarkers that are
combined to obtain the ELF score reflect integral extracellular
matrix (ECM) components of fibrogenesis and fibrolysis processes
which correlate to the progression of disease.
About Siemens Healthcare
The Siemens Healthcare Sector is one of the world's
largest suppliers to the healthcare industry and a trendsetter in
medical imaging, laboratory diagnostics, medical information
technology and hearing aids. Siemens offers its customers products
and solutions for the entire range of patient care from a single
source - from prevention and early detection to diagnosis, and on
to treatment and aftercare. By optimizing clinical workflows for
the most common diseases, Siemens also makes healthcare faster,
better and more cost-effective. Siemens Healthcare employs some
48,000 employees worldwide and operates around the world. In fiscal
year 2010 (to September 30), the
Sector posted revenue of 12.4 billion
euros and profit of around 750
million euros. For further information please visit:
http://www.siemens.com/healthcare