There has never been an effective therapy to reduce major adverse liver outcomes in some patients with severe liver scarring — though a recent Cleveland Clinic-led study shows promise.
The observational research, published Jan. 27 in Nature Medicine, focused on cirrhosis, a chronic disease in which severe scar tissue eclipses healthy liver tissue. The only curative treatment is liver transplantation; without a transplant, the median survival rate is between two and 12 years.
By analyzing patient records for 168 obese adults with cirrhosis caused by metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH), Cleveland Clinic researchers might have found "a safe and effective therapeutic option to influence the trajectory of cirrhosis," according to the study.
Of the 168 patients, 62 underwent metabolic surgery and 106 did not have surgery. The research — which tracked outcomes 15 years after treatment — found that 20.9% of the surgical group experienced major adverse liver outcomes compared to 46.4% of the nonsurgical group.
The incidence rate of developing decompensated cirrhosis, or the occurrence of serious complications, was 15.6% among surgical patients and nearly double (30.7%) among nonsurgical patients.
With the absence of FDA-approved therapies for compensated cirrhosis related to MASH, the findings are a promising headway for treating some of the 4.5 million U.S. adults with diagnosed liver disease, according to the researchers.