Prognostic significance of hemoglobin, albumin, lymphocyte, and platelet (HALP) score in breast cancer: a propensity score-matching study.

Background: The hemoglobin-albumin-lymphocyte-platelet (HALP) score functions as a comprehensive index that assesses the systemic inflammatory response, nutritional, and immune status. This study aimed to explore the relationship between preoperative HALP score and the prognosis of BC patients and to develop predictive nomograms.

Methods: Clinicopathological data were collected for BC patients who underwent mastectomy between December 2010 and April 2014 from Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center. The optimal cutoff value for HALP was determined by maximally selected rank statistics for overall survival data. Propensity score matching (PSM) was applied to develop comparable cohorts of high-HALP group and low-HALP group. Kaplan-Meier curves and Cox regression analyses were performed to determine the impact of HALP on BC patients. Prognostic nomograms were developed based on the multivariate Cox regression method. Then, the concordance index (C-index), calibration plots, and decision curves analysis (DCA) were applied to evaluate the prognostic performance of the nomograms.

Results: A total of 1,856 patients were included as the primary cohort, and 1,470 patients were matched and considered as the PSM cohort. In the primary cohort, the 5-year overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) rates for high-HALP group (≥ 47.89) and low-HALP group (< 47.89) were 94.4% vs. 91.0% (P = 0.005) and 87.8% vs. 82.1% (P = 0.005), respectively. Similar results were observed in PSM cohort (5-year OS, 94.3% vs. 90.8%, P = 0.015; 5-year PFS, 87.5% vs. 83.2%, P = 0.036). Notably, multivariate Cox regression analysis in the PSM cohort showed that HALP could independently predict BC patient prognosis in both OS (HR: 0.596, 95%CI [0.405-0.875], P = 0.008) and PFS (HR: 0.707, 95%CI [0.538-0.930], P = 0.013). OS and PFS nomograms showed excellent predictive performance with the C-indexes of 0.783 and 0.720, respectively. The calibration plots and DCA also indicated the good predictability of the nomograms. Finally, subgroup analysis further demonstrated a favorable impact of HALP on both OS and PFS.

Conclusion: Preoperative HALP score can be used as a reliable independent predictor of OS and PFS in BC patients, and the nomograms may provide a personalized treatment strategy.