Significance of biglycan and osteopontin as non-invasive markers of liver fibrosis in patients with chronic hepatitis B virus and chronic hepatitis C virus

Abstract

Several studies were performed to evaluate the degree of liver fibrosis by non-invasive markers. We aimed to assess the diagnostic value of both biglycan (BGN) and osteopontin (OPN) as non-invasive markers of hepatic fibrosis in patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB) and chronic hepatitis C (CHC). This study was performed on 100 patients with CHB virus, 100 patients with CHC virus and 100 normal controls. All participants were subjected to the following laboratory tests: hemoglobin, platelet, alanine aminotransferase, aspartate aminotransferase, albumin, international normalized ratio, HBs Ag, hepatitis C virus (HCV) antibody, hepatitis B virus DNA, HCV RNA, liver biopsy, BGN and OPN. We found that BGN level was significantly increased in the CHB group compared with the controls (p<0.001), but the level was not different between the CHC group and the controls (p<0.96). OPN was increased in both the CHB and CHC groups compared with the controls (p<0.001). Positive correlation was found between fibrosis stages and BGN level of the CHB group (r=0.64; p<0.001) and between fibrosis stages and OPN level of the CHB (r=0.63; p<0.001) and CHC (r=0.59; p<0.03) groups. The area under the curve (AUC), sensitivity and specificity of BGN were 1.0, 100% and 100% in predicting fibrosis in patients with CHB, and 0.50, 26% and 78% in predicting fibrosis in patients with CHC. OPN had an AUC of 0.997, sensitivity of 96% and specificity of 100% in predicting fibrosis in patients with CHB, and 0.974, 96.5% and 100% in predicting fibrosis in patients with CHC. In conclusion, BGN and OPN could be considered non-invasive markers for liver fibrosis assessment.

Osteopontin Takes Center Stage in Chronic Liver Disease

“…Following liver injury, hepatocytes and inflammatory cells secrete OPN, whereas paradoxically, HSCs do not, despite producing it. (48,49) Serum OPN levels progressively increase from fibrosis stage 0 to 4 in hepatitis B and C (50) patients (Fig. 3B NAFLD-induced fibrosis.…”

Effective delivery of osteopontin small interference RNA using exosomes suppresses liver fibrosis via TGF-β1 signaling

“…In addition, plasma OPN is considered to be a potential prognostic indicator for the advanced liver fibrosis (Matsue et al, 2015). Serum OPN levels progressively increase from stage 0-4 in fibrotic patients with hepatitis B and C (Sobhy et al, 2019). A clinical trial shows plasma OPN is enhanced in NAFLD-induced fibrosis (NCT00794716) (Glass et al, 2018).…”

Molecular Advances in MAFLD—A Link between Sphingolipids and Extracellular Matrix in Development and Progression to Fibrosis

“…In contrast to decorin, biglycan acts as a pro-angiogenic and pro-inflammatory factor [ 64 ]. By activating macrophage toll-like receptors (TLRs) 2 and 4, it modulates the production of cytokines that induce inflammation (i.e., tumor necrosis factor α (TNF-α) or interleukin (IL)-1β) [ 65 , 66 ].…”