The Anti TNF-α medications are using increasingly for the treatment of many liver diseases. This pilot study assess effects of infliximab (anti-TNF-alpha) as a novel therapy in patients with cryptogenic cirrhosis including MELD score and Health-related quality of life (HRQL) by using the chronic liver disease questionnaire (CLDQ) of all selected patients.

In this pilot study, we assigned eight cryptogenic cirrhosis patients to receive 3 infusions of infliximab (3 mg/kg) at weeks 0, 2, and 8 and 3 months after receiving the first dose of infliximab, we measured the biochemical characteristics and the MELD scores of participants calculated. We also assessed the CLDQ and HRQL of all treated patients.

Before infliximab therapy of cryptogenic cirrhotics, we observed poor clinical and emotional features and abnormal biochemical tests in those patients. Treatment with infliximab led to a significant improvement in some of important biochemical characteristics like CRP, Bilirubin, Creatinine (P < 0.05), and consequently, the MELD scores of all selected patients were also improved (P < 0.01). Baseline CLDQ HRQOL scores demonstrated the substantial impairment in those scores, which correlated with the severity of liver disease. After treatment with infliximab, we observed a drastic improvement in CLDQ HRQOL scores (P < 0.01).

We suggest that Infliximab could be considered as a rescue therapy in patients with cryptogenic cirrhosis. Infliximab therapy might be an effective treatment for improvement of CLDQ, HRQOL and MELD scores or in other word, reduction in the severity of cryptogenic liver cirrhosis. However, more studies needed to be conducted in this context.