The Accuracy of Liver Biopsy to Diagnose Biliary Atresia: A Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Objectives: A lot of prolonged jaundice patients may undergo many tests before confirmed diagnosis. Liver biopsy is an effective way in final stage of the course. This article aims to evaluate the accuracy of liver biopsy to diagnose biliary atresia (BA) in infants with cholestasis. Methods: We searched Pubmed, EMBASE and the Web of Science databases for articles evacuated the accuracy of liver biopsy to diagnose BA to obtain the sensitivity, specificity, TN, FN, FP, TP. The methodological quality of liver biopsy was assessed with version 2 of the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies tool. Screening, data extraction, and quality assessment were done in duplicated. Results: A total of 20 articles were included. The whole data results the Diagnostic Odds Ratio of liver biopsy was 170.39 (84.90 to 341.97), with a pooled sensitivity of 92% (90%-94%), pooled specificity of 95% (93%-95%). Conclusion: Quantitative analysis demonstrated liver biopsy to be high sensitivity, high specificity, high accuracy in diagnosing BA. The data analysis provides evidence of liver biopsy is a reliable diagnosis method to confirm diagnosis.