This systematic review and meta-analysis assessed the prognostic value of preoperative blood-based biomarkers in patients with upper tract urothelial carcinoma (UTUC) treated with nephroureterectomy.
PUBMED, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, and Scopus databases were searched in June 2019 according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-analysis statement. Studies were deemed eligible if they compared cancer-specific survival in UTUC patients with and without pretreatment laboratory abnormalities. Formal meta-analyses were performed for this outcome.
The review identified 54 studies with 23,118 patients, of these, 52 studies with 22,513 patients were eligible for the meta-analysis. Several preoperative blood-based biomarkers were significantly associated with cancer-specific survival as follows: neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio (pooled hazard ratio [HR]: 1.66, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.34-2.06), C-reactive protein (pooled HR: 1.17, 95% CI: 1.07-1.29), platelet-lymphocyte ratio (pooled HR: 1.68, 95% CI: 1.30-2.17), white blood cell (pooled HR: 1.58, 95% CI: 1.02-2.46), De Ritis ratio (pooled HR: 2.40, 95% CI: 1.92-2.99), fibrinogen (pooled HR: 2.23, 95% CI: 1.86-2.68), albumin-globulin ratio (pooled HR: 3.00, 95% CI: 1.87-4.84), hemoglobin (pooled HR: 1.51, 95% CI: 1.22-1.87), and estimate glomerular filtration rate (pooled HR: 1.52, 95% CI: 1.19-1.94). The Cochrane's Q test and I2 test revealed significant heterogeneity for neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio, C-reactive protein, white blood cell, hemoglobin, and estimated glomerular filtration rate (P = 0.022; I2 = 50.7%, P = 0.000; I2 = 80.4%, P = 0.000; I2 = 88.3%, P = 0.010; I2 = 62.0%, P = 0.000; I2 = 83.9%, respectively).
Several pretreatment laboratory abnormalities in patients with UTUC were associated with increased risks of cancer-specific mortality. Therefore, blood-based biomarkers may have the potential to serve as prognostic factors to assist patients and physicians in selecting appropriate treatment strategies for UTUC. However, considering the study limitations including heterogeneity and retrospective nature of the primary data, the conclusions should be interpreted with caution.
Urologic oncology. 2020 Feb 19 [Epub ahead of print]
Keiichiro Mori, Florian Janisch, Hadi Mostafaei, Ivan Lysenko, Shoji Kimura, Shin Egawa, Shahrokh F Shariat
Department of Urology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria; Department of Urology, The Jikei University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan., Department of Urology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria; Department of Urology, Medical University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany., Department of Urology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria; Research Center for Evidence Based Medicine, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran., Department of Urology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria., Department of Urology, The Jikei University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan., Department of Urology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria; Institute for Urology and Reproductive Health, I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Moscow, Russia; Department of Urology, Weill Cornell Medical College, New York, NY, USA; Department of Urology, University of Texas Southwestern, Dallas, TX, USA; Karl Landsteiner Institute of Urology and Andrology, Vienna, Austria; Department of Urology, Second Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic. Electronic address: .