The evaluation of pretreatment neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio and derived neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio in patients with laryngeal neoplasms.

Introduction: Systemic inflammatory biomarkers are promising predictive and prognostic factors for solid cancers. The neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio and derived neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio are used to predict inflammation and used as biomarker in several malignancies.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to demonstrate the diagnostic, predictive and prognostic role of neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio and derived neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio in patients with laryngeal neoplasms.

Methods: A retrospective study was conducted on medical records involving 229 patients with benign, premalignant and malignant laryngeal neoplasms between 2002 and 2015. The diagnostic, predictive and prognostic role of neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio and derived neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio were evaluated using uni- and multivariate analysis.

Results: The neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio and derived neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio were not statistically different between patients with benign, premalignant and malignant laryngeal neoplasms. Both neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio and derived neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio were predictive factors for stage, lymph node metastasis, and distant metastasis. Patients with high neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio value (≥4) had a poor prognosis when compared with patients with low neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio value (5 year, Overall Survival: 69.0% vs. 31.1%, p<0.001; 5 year, disease free survival: 70.0% vs. 32.7%, p˂0.001; 5 year, locoregional recurrence free survival: 69.7% vs. 32.0%, p<0.001). Furthermore, neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio was an independent prognostic factor for 5 year: Overall survival (HR=2.396; 95% CI 1.408-4.077; p=0.001), Disease free survival (HR=2.246; 95% CI 1.322-3.816; p=0.006) and locoregional recurrence free survival (HR=2.210; 95% CI 1.301-3.753; p=0.003).

Conclusion: Pretreatment neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio is a useful and reliable predictive and prognostic biomarker for patients with laryngeal carcinoma.