Combining Pre- and Postoperative Lymphocyte–C-Reactive Protein Ratios Can Better Predict Hepatocellular Carcinoma Prognosis After Partial Hepatectomy

Abstract

Background Various preoperative inflammatory indicators have been identified as potential predictors of poor prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but the role of postoperative inflammatory indicators remains unclear. This study aimed to explore the prognostic value of the postoperative lymphocyte–C-reactive protein ratio (PostLCR) on its own and combined with preoperative LCR (PreLCR). Methods A total of 290 patients with primary HCC were retrospectively enrolled in the study. Univariate analysis was used to identify factors significantly associated with poor disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS), then multivariate analysis was performed to identify independent prognostic indicators of poor survival. Prognostic models based on preoperative, postoperative, and both types of indicators were then constructed, and their predictive performance were evaluated using time-dependent receiver operating characteristic curves and the concordance index (C-index). Results PreLCR and PostLCR levels correlated with DFS and OS more strongly than other pre- and postoperative inflammatory indicators, respectively. Decreased PreLCR and PostLCR were independent prognostic factors for both DFS and OS, while HCC patients with decreased PreLCR and PostLCR had worse prognosis than patients with increased PreLCR and PostLCR. Patients into three groups based on their cut-off values of PreLCR and PostLCR, Kaplan–Meier survival analysis indicated that HCC patients with low PreLCR and PostLCR had the worst DFS and OS. The combined model showed better predictive performance at 1 and 3 years post-surgery than individual pre- and postoperative models, the American Joint Committee on Cancer/Tumor-Node-Metastasis (8th edition) staging system and the Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer system. The combine model demonstrated a markedly superior C-index compared with the other models in DFS and OS. Conclusion Our study showed PreLCR and PostLCR are independent predictors of DFS and OS in HCC patients after partial hepatectomy. Models that include both PreLCR and PostLCR can predict prognosis better than well-established clinical staging systems.

Lymphocyte-to-C reactive protein ratio as novel inflammatory marker for predicting outcomes in hemodialysis patients: A multicenter observational study

“…In recent years, the use of a high LCR as a predictor of overall survival has been validated in patients with stomach cancer, hepatocellular carcinoma, bladder cancer, or rectal cancer (19)(20)(21)(22)(23). The results of the present study are consistent with the published literature because high LCR was found to be consistently associated with better overall survival in patients undergoing hemodialysis and in the various subgroups.…”

Prognostic value of lymphocyte-to-C-reactive-protein ratio in cancers

“…However, 11 were not suitable for inclusion criteria. Finally, we identi ed 31 studies from 29 articles published between 2020 and 2023 [14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44]. The ow diagram of the literature search was shown in Fig.…”

Comprehensive prognostic effects of systemic inflammation and Insulin resistance in women with breast cancer with different BMI: a prospective multicenter cohort

“…In this study, for the first time, we found that LCR could be used as an independent prognostic marker in breast cancer patients. Previous studies reported that LCR is associated with poor prognosis in other tumors, such as colorectal cancer 33 , gastric cancer 32 , and hepatocellular carcinoma 44 . As for IR prognostic indicators, previous studies have shown that LHR is associated with poor prognosis in colorectal cancer 45,46 and gastric cancer 47 .…”