Pancreatic Fibrosis as a Prognostic Factor

In chronic pancreatitis, pancreatic fibrosis impairs the ducts patency and secretion and contributes to chronic pain. Another complication of long CP presence is pancreatic exocrine insufficiency (PEI) that is present in 30-90% of patients with CP. Currently, there are no reliable techniques for non-invasive assessment of the pancreatic fibrosis degree. The only accurate method for determining the severity of fibrotic changes in the pancreas is histological examination. Despite the high informativeness of this method, its use is limited by the necessity to obtain biopsy specimens of sufficient diagnostic volume or surgical material, which is associated with the complications risk of an invasive procedure. This makes it impossible to assess the degree of fibrosis in all the patients with pancreatic diseases. It is possible to overcome the limitations by applying non-invasive diagnostic techniques, the development and grounding of which is planned within the framework of the Project.