Albumin provides no benefit to hospitalised patients with advanced liver disease

Liver disease is the fifth most common cause of death in the UK - 'Liver cirrhosis', Credit BruceBlaus on wikicommons , CC BY4. Daily infusions of albumin provide no significant health benefit to patients hospitalised with advanced liver cirrhosis, over and above 'standard care', finds a large-scale multicentre trial led by UCL researchers. Albumin is a protein made in the liver that prevents fluid leaking from the bloodstream to other body tissues and carries various substances throughout the body, such as hormones or enzymes. In people with liver disease, low albumin levels are associated with an increased risk of death among hospitalised patients who have cirrhosis, and laboratory studies have shown albumin to have an anti-inflammatory effect. Therefore, albumin infusions are considered the best fluid for patients with cirrhosis and are an integral part of clinical care. Explaining the ATTIRE* trial, Principal Investigator, Professor Alastair O'Brien (UCL Division of Medicine) said: "Acutely hospitalised patients with cirrhosis are very ill; infection and increased systemic inflammation lead to very high rates of death in those affected. "Albumin infusions have been used with great enthusiasm by liver specialists for 70 years, are widely believed to be the best at reducing abnormal fluid build-up caused by cirrhosis and preclinical studies support an anti-inflammatory role.