Abstract:
Objective To assess the association between preoperative neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelet-lymphocyte ratio (PLR), and red cell distribution width (RDW) and the tumor pathological features in gastric cancer (GC) patients.
Methods We reviewed the records of 434 patients from 2012 to 2014 in Fujian Cancer Hospital. All patients were admitted to the hospital for the first time, and no patients received any cancer-specific pretreatment. For comparison, 309 age-and gender-matched healthy individuals who underwent annual physical examination at the hospital and 342 patients with chronic atrophic gastritis were enrolled.
Results GC patients had higher NLR, PLR, and RDW than the controls (P < 0.000 1). Elevated NLR, PLR, and RDW were associated with the development of tumor stages as indicated by the Kruskal-Wallis analysis. However, no similar association was observed between the tumor differentiation grade and location and those three markers. Multivariate regression analysis further revealed that both NLR and PLR were independent predicting factors for either the tumor TNM or T stage (P < 0.000 1). ROC curve analysis showed that NLR and PLR had a certain diagnostic effect on the preoperative T staging of GC.
Conclusion The preoperative NLR and PLR levels are closely correlated with the tumor TNM stages in GC patients. Both these parameters have potential values as markers to assist either in early diagnosis or preoperative tumor stage evaluation in GC.