Nabi et al reported a simple score for identifying covert hepatic encephalopathy in a patient with cirrhosis. The authors are from Virginia Commonwealth University and McGuire VA Medical Center in Richmond, Virginia.
Patient selection: cirrhosis
Parameters:
(1) age in years
(2) gender
(3) answers to 4 questions (see below)
Parameter
Findings
Points
Beta-Coefficient
age in years
0.1 * (age)
0.0879 * (age
gender
male
0.9
0.9151
female
0
0
not able to maintain balance
no
0
0
yes
2.6
2.6322
irritable or impatient with myself
no
0
0
yes
2.4
2.4295
not doing any of usual physical recreation or activities
no
0
0
yes
1.9
1.8688
eating much less than usual
no
0
0
yes
1.9
1.8870
where:
• The points are rounded values for the beta-coefficients shown in Table 2.
total score =
= SUM(points for all 6 parameters)-6
Interpretation:
• minimum score: -6
• maximum score: depends on age but may be 14
• A total score >= 0 indicates covert hepatic encephalopathy.
Performance:
• The area under the ROC curves is 0.87 (which seems high).
• The sensitivity was 0.80 and specificity 0.79
To read more or access our algorithms and calculators, please log in or register.
