Investigation of the Relationship between Markers of Systemic Inflammatory Response and Head and Neck Tumor Characteristics

Abstract

BackgroundMarkers of systemic inflammation have been hypothesized to reflect the underlying tumor microenvironment, and have recently been shown to be associated with advanced tumor grade, T and N stages.\n\nAims/ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to evaluate the relationship between head and neck cancer (HNC) tumor characteristics and routine pretreatment inflammatory markers: the platelet lymphocyte ratio (PLR), the neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR), and the lymphocyte to monocyte ratio (LMR).\n\nMaterials and MethodsThis is a retrospective cohort study. The tumor characteristics collected were tumor differentiation, T stage, N stage. The relationship between the inflammatory markers and tumor characteristics was analyzed.\n\nResultsA total of 122 patients were enrolled from 2010-2016. An elevated PLR was found to be significantly associated with advanced T stage (rho=0.191, p=0.00347), and N stage (ANOVA, p=0.005). None of the other inflammatory markers (NLR, LMR) were associated with T stage or N stage. No markers were associated with tumor differentiation.\n\nConclusion and significanceWe found that an PLR is significantly associated with advanced tumor and nodal stage. We were unable to find any tumor associations with the other inflammatory markers (NLR, LMR).