1-6 It can be difficult to appraise the relative contribution of comorbidities and MHE on CD without excluding patients with JQ1 concentration comorbidities. However, such exclusion may decrease representativity in daily clinical practice. For this reason, although we believe that CD, in most patients in our study, mainly corresponds to MHE, in the absence of well-established criteria,5, 7 CD in cirrhosis is more appropriate to describe
our population and we preferred therefore to use this term in our study. CD in cirrhosis has become more relevant in recent years because it has been associated with overt HE,2 mortality,1, 8 worsening in quality of life, and deterioration in daily functioning.1, 3, 9 MHE has a negative effect on driving, and these patients are more predisposed to traffic accidents and violations.10, 11 Because CD impairs attention and reaction capability,1, 4 it likely also predisposes patients with cirrhosis to fall, as we observed in a retrospective assessment.12 However, this association has not yet been
prospectively evaluated. Falls are particularly important in patients with cirrhosis HIF activation because their risk of fracture is higher than that in the general population.13 This risk has been attributed to a decrease in bone mass resulting from malnutrition, hypogonadism, and liver insufficiency,14 but it could also be a consequence of CD-related falls.12 Moreover, traumas in patients with cirrhosis are a significant cause of complications and mortality.15 In addition to the negative consequences for the patient, falls selleck products and fractures have implications for the patient’s relatives and are an economic and social burden for the community.16 The Psychometric Hepatic Encephalopathy Score (PHES) consists of a battery of five paper-pencil tests specifically developed for the diagnosis of MHE.2, 4 PHES is scored from the comparison with nomograms in healthy controls; each negative point represents one standard deviation (1 SD) below the mean of the reference population. A result on the PHES <−4
has been proposed for the diagnosis of MHE.2, 4 We designed this study to assess whether, in addition to detecting a cognitive disturbance, the PHES could identify those patients with a higher risk for falls. AUROC, area under the receiver operating characteristics curve; BMI, body mass index; CD, cognitive dysfunction; CFF, critical flicker frequency; HE, hepatic encephalopathy; MAP, mean arterial pressure; MELD: model for end-stage liver disease score; MHE, minimal hepatic encephalopathy; PHES, Psychometric Hepatic Encephalopathy Score; SD, standard deviation; SSRIs, selective serotonin-reuptake inhibitors; TIPS, transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt; TUG, Timed Up-and-Go Test.