Objective: Prognostic performance of inflammation-based prognostic scores, including the Glasgow Prognostic Score (GPS), modified Glasgow Prognostic Score (mGPS), neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelet to lymphocyte ratio (PLR), lymphocyte to monocyte ratio (LMR), Prognostic Index (PI) and Prognostic Nutritional Index (PNI) has been explored in patients with varied types of cancer, though little data is available in intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC). This study sought to evaluate the impact of systemic inflammation on the overall survival (OS) of ICC patients, and to identify more optimal prognostic indices.
Patients and methods: The prognostic power of all the scores mentioned above was compared in 123 patients underwent curative surgery for ICC using Kaplan–Meier curves, COX regression models and the receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curves. The results were validated in a cohort of 95 ICC patients.
Results: Multivariate analysis identified LMR as the only independent inflammation-based predictor for OS in the training cohort (P =0.007, HR 2.082, 95% CI 1.218–3.558). More importantly, the combined score of LMR and pTNM designated the inflammation-based pathological stage (IPS) outperformed other established scores in terms of discriminatory ability, monotonicity and homogeneity in the training and validation cohorts.
Conclusion: This study reveals that preoperative LMR is an independent predictor of OS in ICC patients after hepatectomy, and the IPS can be applied as a novel prognostic indicator in these patients.
Keywords: inflammation-based prognostic score, the lymphocyte to monocyte ratio, intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, prognostic marker, staging system