Fibroscan for assessing liver fibrosis: An acceptable alternative for liver biopsy

There is now adequate evidence to indicate that liver fibrosis is a dynamic rather than a static process and as effective antiviral and other specific therapies became available, fibrosis and even cirrhosis could become reversible (1, 2). Effective and early therapy of viral and autoimmune hepatitis could result in reversibility of cirrhosis in addition to clinical cure (1-3). Therefore, we urgently need to be able to follow the progression or regression of fibrosis in response to therapy in addition to initial assessment of fibrosis by liver biopsy. Liver biopsy which was first introduced in 1923 has been used widely in the diagnosis of liver diseases and is still the gold standard reference for the assessment of liver fibrosis during the course of chronic liver diseases (4, 5).