Table 2.
Liver fibrosis trend indices of the patients categorized according to muscle-quality tertiles and assessed using muscle echo-intensity
| Variable | Muscle quality | Post hoc test | SS* | P for trend* | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Modest (M) | Intermediate (I) | Poor (P) | M vs. I | M vs. P | I vs. P | |||
| All patients (n = 307) | ||||||||
| Number | 103 | 101 | 103 | |||||
| Men | 66 (64.1) | 45 (44.6) | 32 (31.1) | |||||
| Liver stiffness | 6.44 ± 3.15 | 8.90 ± 6.21 | 12.06 ± 11.99 | 0.085 | < 0.001 | < 0.050 | 4.68 | < 0.001 |
| Liver steatosis | 293.51 ± 50.86 | 295.90 ± 42.93 | 278.28 ± 54.28 | > 0.999 | 0.085 | < 0.050 | −2.22 | < 0.050 |
| NFS | −2.25 ± 1.40 | −1.37 ± 1.58 | −0.61 ± 1.68 | < 0.001 | < 0.001 | < 0.010 | 6.96 | < 0.001 |
| FIB-4 index | 1.13 ± 0.70 | 1.65 ± 1.20 | 2.41 ± 1.88 | < 0.050 | < 0.001 | < 0.001 | 7.04 | < 0.001 |
| M2BPGi* | 0.79 ± 0.51 | 0.90 ± 1.13 | 1.37 ± 1.21 | 1.000 | < 0.010 | < 0.010 | 3.68 | < 0.001 |
| Non-obese patients (n = 98) | ||||||||
| Number | 33 | 33 | 32 | |||||
| Men | 18 (54.5) | 17 (51.5) | 10 (31.2) | |||||
| Liver stiffness | 5.09 ± 1.63 | 6.33 ± 4.93 | 11.88 ± 11.09 | > 0.999 | < 0.010 | < 0.010 | 3.77 | < 0.001 |
| Liver steatosis | 261.70 ± 47.31 | 269.12 ± 38.47 | 252.59 ± 45.37 | > 0.999 | > 0.999 | 0.397 | −0.85 | 0.395 |
| NFS | −2.62 ± 1.66 | −1.23 ± 1.47 | −0.52 ± 1.63 | < 0.010 | < 0.001 | 0.235 | 4.76 | < 0.001 |
| FIB-4 index | 1.21 ± 0.80 | 1.89 ± 1.37 | 3.08 ± 2.32 | 0.267 | < 0.001 | < 0.050 | 5.18 | < 0.001 |
| M2BPGi* | 0.75 ± 0.61 | 0.74 ± 0.53 | 1.48 ± 0.77 | > 0.999 | < 0.010 | < 0.010 | 3.60 | < 0.001 |
Values are presented as number (%) or mean±standard deviation. The ranges of muscle echo-intensity for each tertile were as follows: all patients: modest, 40.8–93.0 A.U., intermediate, 93.1–102.2 A.U., poor, 102.2–182.4 A.U.; and non-obese patients: modest, 43.3–92.4 A.U., intermediate, 93.0– 105.6 A.U., poor, 105.9–182.4 A.U.
*The Jonckheere–Terpstra test was used to identify trends in the values across the three groups (two-tailed, P<0.05).
M, modest muscle quality; I, intermediate muscle quality; P, poor muscle quality; SS, standardized statistic; NFS, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) fibrosis score; FIB-4, fibrosis-4; M2BPGi, mac-2–binding protein glycosylation isomer.