Serum hypoxia-inducible factor-1α levels in compensated and decompensated liver cirrhosis: Association with disease severity and MELD score.

Authors

K A Hasanova, T A Asgarova, N Y Bayramov, A A Ibrahimova

Published in

Arab journal of gastroenterology : the official publication of the Pan-Arab Association of Gastroenterology. Oct 05, 2026. Epub Oct 05, 2026.

Abstract

Liver cirrhosis represents the end stage of chronic liver disease and carries high morbidity and mortality. Hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) is a key regulator of cellular adaptation to hypoxia. This cross-sectional study evaluated serum HIF-1α levels in compensated and decompensated liver cirrhosis, their association with clinical and biochemical parameters, and their independent association with the presence of decompensation.
This cross-sectional study included 31 patients with decompensated cirrhosis (DC), 39 with compensated cirrhosis (CC), and 20 healthy controls. Serum HIF-1α was measured by ELISA (Sunlong Biotech, Catalog No. SL0905Hu; range 8-500 pg/mL; sensitivity 4.5 pg/mL). Disease severity was assessed using the MELD score. Statistical analyses included the Mann-Whitney U test, Spearman correlation, multivariate logistic regression, and ROC curve analysis with bootstrap 95% confidence intervals.
Serum HIF-1α was significantly higher in DC (313.5 pg/mL; IQR 264.2-359.0) than CC (165.0 pg/mL; IQR 128.5-208.0) and controls (70.3 pg/mL; IQR 68.1-92.8) (p < 0.001). HIF-1α correlated positively with AST, ALP, ALT, bilirubin, and MELD score, and negatively with albumin (all p < 0.05). On multivariate logistic regression, HIF-1α remained an independent predictor of decompensation after adjustment for bilirubin and albumin (OR = 1.035; 95% CI: 1.016-1.054; p < 0.001; Nagelkerke R² = 0.812; accuracy 90.0%). ROC analysis showed excellent diagnostic performance (AUC = 0.925; bootstrap 95% CI: 0.861-0.975; cut-off 215.5 pg/mL; sensitivity 93.5%; specificity 79.5%).
Serum HIF-1α is significantly elevated in liver cirrhosis, particularly in decompensated disease, and is independently associated with decompensation status. In this single-center cohort without an independent validation set, HIF-1α shows preliminary promise for discriminating compensated from decompensated cirrhosis; its predictive and diagnostic utility requires confirmation in larger, multicenter, prospectively validated cohorts.

PMID:
42833959
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 06 Oct 2026.

Read full publication at:
Please sign in to see all details.

Stats

1-terrible, 9-excellent. How would you rate this publication? Sign in in to submit your rating.

Post a comment

You need to be signed in to post comments. You can sign in here.

Comments

There are no comments yet.