Whether neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) is an applicative predictor of poor prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains controversial. In response to the current conflicting data, this meta-analysis was conducted to gain a comprehensive and systematic understanding of prognostic value of NLR in HCC.

Several English databases, including PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library, with an update date of February 25, 2023, were systematically searched. We set the inclusion criteria to include randomized controlled trial (RCT) studies that reported the prognostic value of serum NLR levels in patients with HCC receiving treatment. Both the combined ratio (OR) and the diagnosis ratio (DOR) were used to assess the prognostic performance of NLR. Additionally, we completed the risk of bias assessment by Cochrane Risk of Bias Assessment Tool.

This meta-analysis ultimately included 16 studies with a total of 4654 patients with HCC. The results showed that high baseline NLR was significantly associated with poor prognosis or recurrence of HCC. The sensitivity of 0.67 (95% confidence interval [CI]. 0.59-0.73); specificity of 0.723 (95% CI: 0.64-0.78) and DOR of 5.0 (95% CI: 4.0-7.0) were pooled estimated from patient-based analyses. Subsequently, the combined positive likelihood ratio (PLR) and negative likelihood ratio (NLHR) were calculated with the results of 2.4 (95% CI: 1.9-3.0) and 0.46 (95% CI: 0.39-0.56), respectively. In addition, area under the curve (AUC) of the summary receiver operating characteristic (SROC) reflecting prognostic accuracy was calculated to be 0.75 (95% CI: 0.71-0.78). The results of subgroup analysis suggested that high NLR was an effective predictive factor of poor prognosis in HCC in mainland China as well as in the northern region.

Our findings suggest that high baseline NLR is an excellent predictor of poor prognosis or relapse in patients with HCC, especially those from high-incidence East Asian populations.

https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/#recordDetails, identifier CRD42023440640.

An increasing number of studies have confirmed that non-textbook outcomes (non-TO) are a risk factor for the long-term outcome of malignant tumors. It is particularly important to identify the predictive factors of non-TO to improve the quality of surgical treatment. We attempted to construct two nomograms for preoperative and postoperative prediction of non-TO after laparoscopic hepatectomy for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Patients who underwent curative-intent hepatectomy for HCC between 2014 and 2021 at two Chinese hospitals were analyzed. Using univariate and multivariate analyses, the independent predictors of non-TO were identified. The prediction accuracy is accurately measured by the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve and calibration curve. ROC curves for the preoperative and postoperative models, Child-Pugh grade, BCLC staging, and 8th TNM staging were compared relative to predictive accuracy for non-TO.

Among 515 patients, 286 patients (55.5%) did not achieve TO in the entire cohort. Seven and eight independent risk factors were included in the preoperative and postoperative predictive models by multivariate logistic regression analysis, respectively. The areas under the ROC curves for the postoperative and preoperative models, Child-Pugh grade, BCLC staging, and 8th TNM staging in predicting non-TO were 0.762, 0.698, 0.579, 0.569, and 0.567, respectively.

Our proposed preoperative and postoperative nomogram models were able to identify patients at high risk of non-TO following laparoscopic resection of HCC, which may guide clinicians to make individualized surgical decisions, improve postoperative survival, and plan adjuvant therapy against recurrence.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common type of liver cancer and has a high risk of invasion and metastasis along with a poor prognosis.

To investigate the independent predictive markers for disease-free survival (DFS) in patients with HCC and establish a trustworthy nomogram.

In this study, 445 patients who were hospitalized in The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical College between December 2009 and December 2014 were retrospectively examined. The survival curve was plotted using the Kaplan-Meier method and survival was determined using the log-rank test. To identify the prognostic variables, multivariate Cox regression analyses were carried out. To predict the DFS in patients with HCC, a nomogram was created. C-indices and receiver operator characteristic curves were used to evaluate the nomogram's performance. Decision curve analysis (DCA) was used to evaluate the clinical application value of the nomogram.

Longer DFS was observed in patients with the following characteristics: elderly, I-II stage, and no history of hepatitis B. The calibration curve showed that this nomogram was reliable and had a higher area under the curve value than the tumor node metastasis (TNM) stage. Moreover, the DCA curve revealed that the nomogram had good clinical applicability in predicting 3- and 5-year DFS in HCC patients after surgery.

Age, TNM stage, and history of hepatitis B infection were independent factors for DFS in HCC patients, and a novel nomogram for DFS of HCC patients was created and validated.

In many countries, preterm birth, defined as birth before 37 completed weeks of gestation, is the primary cause of infant death and morbidity. An increasing body of research suggests that inflammation (both clinical and subclinical) plays a significant role in inducing preterm labor or developing pregnancy problems that lead to premature birth. Consequently, the purpose of this research was to determine the predictive value of the Neutrophil-Lymphocyte Ratio (NLR), derived Neutrophil-Lymphocyte Ratio (dNLR), Monocytes-to-Lymphocyte Ratio (MLR), Platelets-to-Lymphocyte Ratio (PLR), Systemic immune-inflammation index (SII), and systemic inflammatory response index (SIRI), for premature delivery. A retrospective study analyzed a total of 243 eligible pregnancies that resulted in a preterm birth during 2020 and 2021. A control group without a history of preterm birth was matched by age and trimester of laboratory analysis at a 1:1 ratio. Although the number of comorbidities was similar among study groups, the body-mass index estimated for the week of gestation was significantly higher among the patients from the prematurity group, as well as the prevalence of urinary tract infections and smoking. Laboratory data showed that patients with a preterm birth had significantly higher white blood cell count and monocytes, but significantly lower lymphocytes, platelets, and hemoglobin. The NLR, dNLR, PLR, and MLR scores showed to be significantly higher among patients from the prematurity group, but SII and SIRI were not significantly different between the study groups. It was observed that the AUC values of NLR, dNLR, PLR, and MLR were higher than 0.600, respectively NLR had the highest value among the tested scores (AUC = 0.694) and the highest sensitivity in this study (71%). The highest sensibility was achieved by dNLR, with 70%, and an AUC value of 0.655 (p-value = 0.022). PLR had the second-highest AUC value (0.682) and the best score in terms of sensitivity (70%) and sensibility (69%) (p-value = 0.015). Lastly, MLR had the lowest significant AUC score (0.607) and lowest sensitivity/sensibility. The significant cut-off values for the inflammatory scores were 9.0 for NLR, 9.8 for dNLR, 250 for PLR, and 4.07 for MLR. After evaluating the importance of these inflammatory scores, further clinical applications should be conducted to confirm the results and improve therapy and care to reduce the burden of premature deliveries.

Liver-related diseases, including liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), are significant causes of mortality globally. Specific causes and predictors of liver-related mortality in low resource settings require assessment to help inform clinical decision making and develop strategies for improved survival. The objectives of this study were to determine the proportion of liver-related deaths associated with liver cirrhosis, HCC, and their known risk factors, and secondly to determine predictors of in-hospital mortality among cirrhosis and HCC patients in Ghana. We first performed a cross-sectional review of death register entries from 11 referral hospitals in Ghana to determine the proportion of liver-related deaths and the proportion of risk factors associated with these deaths. Secondly, we conducted a retrospective cohort review of 172 in-patient liver cirrhosis and HCC cases admitted to a tertiary referral centre and determined predictors of in-hospital mortality using binary logistic regression and Kaplan-Meier survival analysis. In total, 8.8% of deaths in Ghanaian adults were due to liver-related causes. The proportion of liver-related deaths attributed to HBV infection was 48.8% (95% CI: 45.95-51.76), HCV infection was 7.0% (95% CI: 5.58-8.45), HBV-HCV co-infection 0.5% (95% CI: 0.1-0.9) and alcohol was 10.0% (95% CI: 8.30-11.67). Of 172 cases of HCC and liver cirrhosis, the in-patient mortality rate was 54.1%. Predictors of in-patient mortality in cirrhotic patients were increasing WBC (OR = 1.14 95% CI: 1.00-1.30) and the revised model for end-stage liver disease with sodium (MELD-Na) score (OR = 1.24 95% CI: 1.01-1.54). For HCC patients, female sex (OR = 3.74 95% CI: 1.09-12.81) and hepatic encephalopathy (grade 1) were associated with higher mortality (OR = 5.66 95% CI: 1.10-29.2). In conclusion, HBV is linked to a high proportion of HCC-related deaths in Ghana, with high in-hospital mortality rates that require targeted policies to improve survival.