Relationship Between Serum Iron Profile and Liver Density in Non-Enhanced CT-Scan

It is known that liver biopsy is gold standard of diagnosing of liver iron deposition.by considering liver biopsy complication & cost, introducing a method to restrict unnecessary biopsy or even an alternative for liver biopsy can be useful. This study examined the relationship between serum iron profile levels with liver density on CT-Scan without contrast material injection.


In this study, 76 patients were referred from different Rasoul-Akram Hospital parts in 2015-2016 (People who have undergone abdominal CT-scan for any reason and blood tests included iron and fat profiles). To calculate the liver mean density of a CT-scan, densities of 12 sites with an individual area of 1cm2 on 3 different sections of the liver was obtained and their average was recorded. Data were analyzed by SPSS V.22 using Kolmogorov-Smirnov,  independent T-test, and two-sample tests with a significance level of P-value <0.05.


There is a significant relationship between the serum iron and serum ferritin levels with liver density. By increasing TIBC levels, the difference between liver and spleen densities increases, but no significant correlation was found between TIBC level and liver density. Moreover, there was no relationship between serum iron levels and serum ferritin with the difference between liver and spleen densities.


The evaluation of liver density may be an alternative to liver biopsy in some cases or at least can be considered to restrict unnecessary biopsies.