THE STRUCTURAL AND FUNCTIONAL STATE OF THE PANCREAS AND LIVER IN CHRONIC PANCREATITIS IN COMBINATION WITH CHRONIC VIRAL HEPATITIS C DEPENDING ON THE INDEX OF THE SURVEY ACCORDING TO THE INTERNATIONAL CAGE QUESTIONNAIRE
Authors: Khomyn Halyna O. , Babinets Liliya S. , Halabitska Iryna M. 
Published: April 2023

The aim: To conduct a comparative analysis of parameters of the structural and functional state of the liver and pancreas in patients with chronic pancreatitis in comorbidity with treated etiologically chronic viral hepatitis C, depending on the results of testing according to the international CAGE questionnaire.
Materials and methods: 100 ambulatory patients with CP with concomitant HCV, treated etiotropically, were examined. All patients were examined ac¬cording to generally accepted algorithms. To establish the role of alcohol on the formation of CP and the condition of patients with treated HCV, latent craving for alcohol was verified using the international CAGE questionnaire. The study of the density of the liver parenchyma and the liver of the patients was carried out not only according to the ultrasound data in the B-mode, but also with the simultaneous measurement of the shear wave elastography (SWE) method on the Ultima PA scanning ultrasound device with the further determination of the median of the parameters, which characterizes the stiffness in kilopascals (kPa). Determination of the presence and depth of pancreatic exocrine insufficiency (PEI) was carried out by the content of fecal elastase-1 (FE-1), which was determined by the enzyme immunoassay method.
Results: Screening-testing of patients with CP on the background of etiotropically treated HCV using the CAGE scale made it possible to state that 65.0% of such patients had a hidden craving for alcohol, and 21.0% of this cohort were women, which needs to be taken into account in the management of such patients. It has been proven that in the group of patients with CAGE≥2.0, the level of functional and structural changes in the liver and liver was significantly more severe (according to the deepening of the PEI, a decrease in fecal α-elastase by 13.01%, according to an increase in the total index of the coprogram by 15.11% and the total US-indicator of the pancreas structure by 28.06%, and the total US-indicator of the liver structure – by 40.68% (р<0.05) and corre¬sponded to the average degree of severity of the process in panceas according to the criteria of the Marseille-Cambridge classification, and in the group with CAGE<2.0 – only a mild degree.
Conclusions: The negative effect of the factor of increased alcohol use according to CAGE was proven by increasing the density of the echostructure of the liver by 5.73% (p<0.05), and the liver by 5.16% (p<0.05). According to the results of the correlation analysis of the dependence of the structural state of the liver and PW of the studied patients on the value of the CAGE scale, which was R=0.713, p<0.05, and R=0.686, p<0.05, respectively, it was established that there is a strong direct dependence of the structural state of the liver and PW from the value of the CAGE questionnaire, which proved an independent, reliably significant role of alcohol consumption for patients with a comorbid course of CP and HCV.