[Prognosis of portal hypertension in hepatitic cirrhosis of the liver (author's transl)].

Laparoscopic transhepatic measurement of pressures in the branches of the portal vein (and hepatic vein) were performed in 42 patients with hepatitic cirrhosis of the liver and compared with those obtained in patients with other defined causes of cirrhosis (alcohol, pigment, Budd-Chiari syndrome, right heart failure). Mean portal vein pressure was 27.2, mean hepatic vein pressure 14.5 mm Hg. A significant pressure difference (Kruskal-Wallis test) was present only between hepatitic cirrhosis and congestive cirrhosis, not alcohol or pigment cirrhosis. During the period of observation (1975-1978) there was a high incidence of deaths and complications in the hepatitic group compared with other forms of cirrhosis: 6 treatment-resistant and 2 successfully treated cases of bleeding from oesophageal varices. The risk of bleeding begins at a pressure above 27 mm Hg, but in individual cases it cannot be used to prognosticate.