cirrhosis c diff

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Patients with decompensated cirrhosis are prone to develop neutropenia. Although hypersplenism and increased clearance of polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN) in the spleen are thought to contribute to neutropenia in these patients, other factors cannot be excluded. The aim of the current study was to investigate whether the presence of increased PMN apoptosis could also contribute to the appearance of neutropenia in these patients. METHODS: PMN were isolated by Ficoll-Hypaque gradient centrifugation from 17 patients with decompensated cirrhosis (CH group) and 13 patients with compensated chronic liver disease (CT group)...