Liver Point-of-Care Ultrasound (POCUS): Roadmap for training, credentialing, and implementation

Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) offers unique, real-time advantages for assessing liver disease, benefiting both health care providers and patients. It has been shown to enhance patient care and satisfaction across a variety of medical specialties. Although liver POCUS is practiced widely in many parts of the world, its use in the United States remains limited. Liver POCUS enables rapid assessment of specific hepatic conditions, including both vascular and parenchymal abnormalities, and can play a key role in timely management decision-making—such as guiding the use of diuretics or volume expanders. Once liver POCUS is established, ultrasonography-enabled procedures, such as procedure guidance and shear wave elastography, may be adopted and enrich the practice of hepatology in the future. This paper serves as a summary of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases' (AASLD) current position on liver POCUS, offering proposed imaging protocols, recommendations for training and credentialing, and practical guidelines for implementation in clinical settings.