Serum troponin is elevated in acute decompensation and acute-on-chronic liver failure and is associated with severity of liver disease and short-term mortality

Background The role of high sensitive cardiac Troponin (hs-cTn) in patients with liver cirrhosis (LC) and liver-related acute events is not well established.Aim To assess the prognostic performance of hs-cTn I in acute decompensation (AD) and acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF).Methods Two cohorts of consecutive patients, a derivation (retrospective) and a validation (prospective), were evaluated and 30-day-mortality was recorded. Hs-cTnI values were measured. Very low hs-cTnΙ (4 ng/L) was considered the cutoff-level.Results A total of 296 patients with LC [69.3% male, median age 57 (IQR 51–68) years, MELD score 19 (13–25), ACLF (29.4%), AD (48.3%), and without liver-related acute events (22.3%)] were included in the derivation cohort. The 66.2% of total patients had hs-cTnI ≥4 ng/L. Patients with hs-cTnI ≥4 ng/L were older and had more severe LC compared to those with <4ng/L. The multivariate analysis demonstrated that age (p < 0.001) and MELD (p = 0.001) were independent variables associated with elevated hs-cTnI after adjustment for age, sex and hepatic encephalopathy in total patients.When ACLF and AD were analyzed separately, the mortality was higher in patients with hs-cTnI ≥ 4 ng/L compared to lower values (log-rank p = 0.036 and p = 0.019, respectively). In multivariate analysis, MELD (p < 0.001) and hs-cTnI ≥4 ng/L (p = 0.032) were independent prognostic factors of mortality in ACLF/AD groups, after adjustment for age and sex. Similar results were obtained from the validation cohort (N = 148).Conclusions hs-cTnI levels were higher in patients with severe liver disease. The low cutoff-point of 4 ng/L is accurate in ruling out non-survivors mainly in AD group.