Scientific News

While alpha1-antitrypsin deficiency (AATD) - associated liver disease is still greatly understudied, several recently published studies improved our knowledge about this genetic condition caused by mutations in the SERPINA1 gene encoding for alpha-1 antitrypsin. [read more]

The results of the EU survey on the availability of age-appropriate medication for children with autoimmune liver disease (AILD) were recently published with the Journal of Hepatology. [read more]

During the ongoing SARS-CoV-2 pandemic it is of great importance to identify patients at risk of a severe course of COVID-19. [read more]

The authors previously published the results of an international collaboration of three large registries, including the R-LIVER registry of ERN RARE-LIVER, on COVID-19 in adult patients with autoimmune hepatitis. In this work, the authors report on 21 pediatric liver transplantation (LT) recipients and 16 pediatric chronic liver disease (CLD) patients with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection from 10 European centres.  [read more]

Background: More patient data are needed to improve research on rare liver diseases. Mobile health apps enable an exhaustive data collection. Therefore, the European Reference Network on Hepatological diseases (ERN RARE-LIVER) intends to implement an app for patients with rare liver diseases communicating with a patient registry, but little is known about which features patients and their healthcare providers regard as being useful. [read more]

Detection of autoantibodies is crucial for the diagnosis autoimmune hepatitis (AIH). Lack of sensitivity and specificity of conventional autoantibodies complicates the diagnostic process. Lack of sensitivity and specificity of conventional autoantibodies complicates the diagnostic process for AIH. Dres. Taubert, Engel and Jaeckel, in collaboration with several colleagues from ERN rare liver and the international autoimmune hepatitis group, aimed to identify more accurate biomarkers for the diagnosis of AIH.  [read more]