Significance and prognostic value of increased serum direct bilirubin level for lymph node metastasis in Chinese rectal cancer patients

Table 3 Multivariate analysis: significance of increased serum direct bilirubin for rectal cancer patients with lymph node metastasis

Variable	Adjusted OR	95%CI	P value
Direct bilirubin ≥ 2.60 μmol/L	1.602	1.098-2.338	0.015
Age < 60 yr	1.851	1.259-2.724	0.002
Serum sodium ≤ 141 mmol/L	-	-	0.090

Four hundred and fifty-seven patients were included because the data were not available for 12 patients. Carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) was excluded because data were not available in 77 patients and preliminary multivariate analysis results showed that CEA was not associated with lymph node metastasis in our patients. For clinical practice, these continuous variables were changed to categorical variables, and the cutoff values were determined based on the combination of sensitivity, specificity, Youden index, receiver operator characteristics curves and areas under the curve.