Nomograms to predict the presence and extent of inguinal lymph node metastasis in penile cancer patients with clinically positive lymph nodes

Abstract

Background: We developed two nomograms to predict the presence of inguinal lymph node metastasis (ILNM) and two or more histologically positive inguinal lymph nodes (ILNs) or one ILN with extranodal extension (ENE) in penile cancer patients with clinically positive inguinal lymph nodes (ILNs).Methods: This study enrolled 75 penile squamous cell carcinoma (PSCC) patients with clinically positive ILNs. A binary logistic regression model was taken to screen out the risk factors for the presence of ILNM and two or more positive ILNs or one node with ENE in one side. Nomograms were plotted based on the results of multivariate logistic regression analysis.Results: Our multivariate analysis demonstrated that the pathological grade, lymphovascular invasion (LVI), and short diameter (SD) of the largest ILN were independent risks. The bootstrap-corrected concordance index of the nomogram for the presence of ILNM was 0.948, and 0.878 for two or more histologically positive ILNs or one ILN with ENE on one side.Conclusions: By incorporating tumor pathological grade, LVI and SD of the largest ILN, our nomograms can efficiently predict the ILNM in penile cancer patients with clinically positive nodes.

Predictive histopathological factors of nodal metastasis in penile cancer

“…Several nomograms have been created to predict lymph node metastasis ( 29 , 47 , 48 ). However, the diverging importance of each individual histological parameter results in poor performance of the combination of these parameters in nomograms.…”