Prevalence of hepatic steatosis in patients with type 2 diabetes and response to glucose-lowering treatments. A multicenter retrospective study in Italian specialist care.

Aim: Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is a risk factor for metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD), which is becoming the commonest cause of chronic liver disease worldwide. We estimated MAFLD prevalence among patients with T2D using the hepatic steatosis index (HSI) and validated it against liver ultrasound. We also examined whether glucose-lowering medications (GLM) beneficially affected HSI.

Methods: We collected data from 46 diabetes clinics (n = 281,381 T2D patients), extracted data to calculate HSI and validated it against ultrasound-detected hepatic steatosis. We then examined changes in HSI among patients with a follow-up visit within 1 year after initiating newer GLMs.

Results: MAFLD (defined by HSI > 36, i.e., a high probability of steatosis) was present in 76.3% of the 78,895 included patients, while only 2.7% had HSI < 30 (low probability of steatosis). After age- and sex-adjusting, higher HSI was associated with higher prevalence of chronic kidney disease (odds ratio 1.35; 95%CI 1.22-1.51) and macroangiopathy (odds ratio 1.18; 95%CI 1.07-1.30). Among 2,179 subjects in the validation cohort, the prevalence of MAFLD was 67.8% and was greater in those with high HSI. Performance of HSI for ultrasound-detected MAFLD was moderate (AUROC 0.70), yet steatosis prevalence was > threefold higher among subjects with HSI > 36 than among those with HSI < 30. Notably, HSI declined significantly ~ 6 months after initiation of dapagliflozin or incretin-based therapies, but not gliclazide.

Conclusion: About three quarters of patients with T2D have HSI values suggestive of MAFLD, a condition associated with macroangiopathy and nephropathy. Treatment with dapagliflozin or incretin therapies might improve MAFLD in T2D.