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©The Author(s) 2025. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Hepatol. Nov 27, 2025; 17(11): 110698
Published online Nov 27, 2025. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v17.i11.110698
Published online Nov 27, 2025. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v17.i11.110698
Cytokeratin 18 fragment is associated with steatosis-associated fibrosis estimator score and lipid in patients with steatotic liver disease
Tatsuki Ichikawa, Mio Yamashima, Shinobu Yamamichi, Makiko Koike, Yusuke Nakano, Hiruyuki Yajima, Osamu Miyazaki, Tomonari Ikeda, Takauma Okamura, Naohiro Komatsu, Miruki Yoshino, Department of Gastroenterology, Nagasaki Harbor Medical Center, Nagasaki 850-8555, Japan
Satoshi Miuma, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Nagasaki University, Naga
Hisamitsu Miyaaki, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Nagasaki University Gra
Author contributions: Ichikawa T wrote the manuscript and designed the study; Ichikawa T and Miuma S confirmed the authenticity of the raw data; Ichikawa T, Yamashima M, Yamamichi S, Koike M, Nakano Y, Yajima H, Miyazaki O, Ikeda T, Okamura T, Komatsu N, Yoshino M, and Miyaaki H collected the data; Nakao Y analyzed the data; All authors have read and approved the final manuscript.
Institutional review board statement: The protocol for this research project has been approved by a suitably constituted Ethics Committee of the Institution (Committee of Nagasaki Harbor Medical Center, No. H30-057) and it conforms to the provisions of the Declaration of Helsinki.
Informed consent statement: Informed consent was obtained from each patient included in the study and they were guaranteed the right to leave the study if desired (opt out).
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement-checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement-checklist of items.
Data sharing statement: The data generated in the present study are not publicly available (compelling reason exists owing to which the data are not public), but may be requested from the corresponding author.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Tatsuki Ichikawa, MD, Department of Gastroenterology, Nagasaki Har
Received: June 13, 2025
Revised: July 3, 2025
Accepted: September 25, 2025
Published online: November 27, 2025
Processing time: 167 Days and 23.1 Hours
Revised: July 3, 2025
Accepted: September 25, 2025
Published online: November 27, 2025
Processing time: 167 Days and 23.1 Hours
Core Tip
Core Tip: Serum cytokeratin 18 fragment (CK18F) has been developed as a new non-invasive test for risk assessment of steatotic liver disease (SLD). We included 125 patients who were assessed for SLD and had CK18F measured. Steatosis-associated fibrosis estimator (SAFE) score, liver stiffness (LS), and FibroScan-aspartate aminotransferase (FAST) score were compared with CK18F. CK18F was associated with aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, and triglycerides (TGs). FAST and SAFE score were associated with high CK18F (> 260 U/L), but not fibrosis-4 or LS. Risk of high CK18F was higher when high TG and low high-density lipoprotein were combined than when each was present alone.