Neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio as a predictor of preoperative tumor staging in testicular germ cell tumors

OBJECTIVES: The aim of our study was to evaluate associations of elevated preoperative neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) with testicular germ cell tumors (GCT) characteristics other than cancer specifi c survival (CSS) and progression free survival (PFS). BACKGROUND: NLR was recently presented as a widely available and inexpensive marker of poor prognosis in several types of solid tumors. Previous study showed no predictive value of NLR for CSS and PFS in testicular GCT. METHODS: Association of high NLR with histological type of tumor, presence of metastatic disease preoperatively and worse than T1 stadium in TNM classifi cation preoperatively was analyzed in 103 patients who underwent radical orchiectomy for testicular GCT. RESULTS: No statistically signifi cant difference in the prevalence of seminomas and non-seminomas neither in the group with NLR >= 4 (p = 0.6698) nor in the group with NLR< 4 (p = 0.9115) was detected. Similarly, no statistically signifi cant difference in the prevalence of metastatic and non-metastatic disease in the group with NLR= 4 (p = 0.2008), however statistically signifi cant higher prevalence of non-metastatic disease in the group with NLR< 4 (p = 0.0001) was found. There was a statistically signifi cant higher number of patients with worse than T1 stadium in patients with NLR= 4 (p = 0.0105), but not signifi cant difference in the group with NLR< 4 (p = 0.0956). CONCLUSION: The results of our study showed that NLR lower than 4 predicts non-metastatic disease and NLR higher or equal 4 predicts worse than T1 stadium (Tab. 3, Ref. 12). Text in PDF www. elis. sk.