The performance of shear wave elastography on evaluating liver changes in obese and overweight children

Background. Real time shear-wave elastography (SWE) is a non-invasive imaging method which can quantitatively assess liver stiffness. Obesity and its complication are increasing with improving lifestyles in our century. We evaluated the performance of SWE for detecting liver changes (fatty liver, steatohepatitis) in obese and overweight children, in addition to this, we determined the diagnostic accuracy and clinical usefulness of SWE in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Methods. Obese and overweight 41 children within the age range of 6-15 years were included in this single center prospective study. Biochemical evaluation for aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), triglyceride (TG), total cholesterol (TC) levels, as well as conventional ultrasound and SWE of the liver were performed in the patient group. These values were compared with values of 25 normal weight and healthy children in the age range of 6-16 years. Results. The mean SWE values was 13.7 +/- 5.5 kiloPascal (kPa) and 2.03 +/- 0.35 meter/second (m/s) in patient group and 7.99 +/- 2.81 kPa and 1.62 +/- 0.21 m/s in control group (p