Utility of splenic transient elastography in assessing the presence of portal hypertension: A review

Table 1 Summary of different methods for estimation of splenic stiffness

Modality	Feasibility	Availability	Cost	Operator dependence
Transient elastography	High	Widely available	Low	High
Shear-wave elastography	Moderate	Moderately available	Moderate	Moderate
Magnetic resonance elastography	Low	Limited to tertiary centers	High	Low

Table 2 Survey of studies where splenic stiffness estimation using transient elastography for the presence of varices was performed[27-36]

Ref.	Pathologies studied	Cut-off (in kPa)	Sensitivity	Specificity
Stefanescu et al[27], 2011	HCV/ALD	46.4	83.5	71.0
Colecchia et al[28], 2012	HCV	55.0	96.0	85.0
Sharma et al[29], 2013	ALD/HBV/HCV/CLD	40.8	94.0	76.0
Calvaruso et al[30], 2013	HCV	50.0	65.0	61.0
Fraquelli et al[31], 2014	HBV/HCV/MPD	48.0	100	60.0
Zykus et al[32], 2015	ALD/HCV/CLD	50.7	78.1	77.1
Rewisha et al[33], 2016	HCV	43.2	92.9	84.5
Tseng et al[34], 2018	HBV/HCV/AIH/PBC/NAFLD/CLD	48.9	76.0	100
Ferreira-Silva et al[35], 2023	ALD	54.0	72.2	60.9
Lantinga et al[36], 2023	ALD/NAFLD/HCV/HBV/AIH	46.4	82.0	80.0

AIH: Autoimmune hepatitis; ALD: Alcoholic liver disease; CLD: Cryptogenic liver disease; HBV: Hepatitis B virus; HCV: Hepatitis C virus; MPD: Myeloproliferative disorder; NAFLD: Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease; PBC: Primary biliary cholangitis.

Table 3 Summary of some main causes of non-cirrhotic portal hypertension

Group of causes	Example of specific disorders
Immunological disorders	CVID, CD, Organ transplant patients, autoimmune conditions (e.g., SLE)
Infections	Bacterial intestinal infections (esp. during childhood), helminths (e.g., schistosomiasis), HIV
Medications and toxins	Thiopurines, vitamin A, chemotherapeutic agents
Thrombotic and hematological conditions	Myeloproliferative syndromes; thrombophilias predisposing to MVT
Genetic disorders	Turner syndrome

CD: Crohn’s disease; CVID: Common variable immunodeficiency; HIV: Human immunodeficiency virus; MVT: Mesenteric vein thrombosis; SLE: Systemic lupus erythematosus.