Association of post-treatment hypoalbuminemia and survival in Chinese patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma

Nomogram incorporating Epstein-Barr virus DNA and a novel immune-nutritional marker for survival prediction in nasopharyngeal carcinoma

BACKGROUND

Since Immune response, nutritional status and Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV) DNA status have been confirmed to be relevant to the prognosis of patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), we believe that the combination of these factors is of great value for improving the predictive ability. LA (lymphocytes × albumin), a novel indicator, had not been studied yet in NPC. We combined it with EBV DNA and used nomograms to increase the accuracy of prognosis.

METHODS

A total of 688 NPC patients were retrospectively reviewed and further divided into training and validation cohort randomly. Kaplan-Meier analyses were used to to distinguish the different survival outcomes. Multivariate Cox analyses were used to identify the independent prognostic factors for progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Calibration curves, concordance indexes (C-indexes) and decision curve analyses (DCA) were used to evaluate the nomograms' predictive value.

RESULTS

Patients with low LA and positive EBV DNA correlated with poorer 5-year PFS and OS (all P < 0.005). In multivariate Cox analyses, LA and EBV DNA were both confirmed to be independent prognostic factors for PFS and OS (all P < 0.05). Prognostic nomograms incorporating LA and EBV DNA achieved ideal C-indexes of 0.69 (95% CI: 0.65-0.73) and 0.77 (95% CI: 0.71-0.82) in the prediction of PFS and OS. Otherwise, the calibration curves and DCA curves also revealed that our nomograms had pleasant predictive power.

CONCLUSIONS

LA is a novel and powerful biomarker for predicting clinical outcomes in NPC. Our nomograms based on LA and EBV DNA can predict individual prognosis more accurately and effectively.

Pre-operative hypoalbuminemia is associated with increased mortality in patients undergoing surgery for gynecologic malignancy - A retrospective cohort study

OBJECTIF

L'objectif était d'évaluer l'association entre un faible taux d'albumine préopératoire sur la mortalité à court terme (mortalité à 90 jours et à 1 an) chez des patientes ayant subi une intervention chirurgicale à XXXX pour traiter une tumeur maligne gynécologique. MéTHODES: Cette étude de cohorte rétrospective porte sur des patientes ayant subi une intervention chirurgicale à XXXXX entre le 1^erjanvier 2010 et le 30 juin 2016 pour des tumeurs malignes gynécologiques. Des analyses de régression logistique univariée et multivariée ont été réalisées pour évaluer l'association entre le taux sérique d'albumine préopératoire et le taux de mortalité à 90 jours et à 1 an. L'analyse a d'abord examiné le taux d'albumine en tant que variable continue, puis comme variable catégorielle après la détermination des seuils cliniquement pertinents. RéSULTATS: Au total, 2 183 patientes ont été incluses dans l'analyse. Dans la population à l'étude, 51,8 % des patientes avaient un taux sérique d'albumine préopératoire inférieur à 35 g/L. L'étude a relevé deux points d'inflexion déterminants dans le taux de mortalité par taux sérique d'albumine. Le taux de mortalité était nettement le plus élevé chez les patientes ayant un taux d'albumine inférieur à 20 g/L (mortalité à 90 jours : 17,2 %; mortalité à 1 an : 31,9 %) et plus élevé chez celles ayant un taux d'albumine entre 20 et 25 g/L (mortalité à 90 jours : 2,7 %; mortalité à 1 an : 12,0 %) comparativement à celles ayant un taux d'albumine supérieur à 25 g/L (mortalité à 90 jours : 0,9 %; mortalité à 1 an : 3,9 %). Dans les analyses univariée et multivariée, une importante association indépendante a été établie entre l'hypoalbuminémie préopératoire et l'augmentation du taux de mortalité à 90 jours et à 1 an (p< 0,001).

CONCLUSION

L'hypoalbuminémie préopératoire est indépendamment associée à une augmentation du risque de mortalité à court terme. Les patientes qui sont opérées pour des tumeurs malignes gynécologiques et qui ont un taux sérique d'albumine préopératoire inférieur à 20 g/L présentent un risque très élevé de mortalité à court terme.

Albumin levels predict prognosis in advanced renal cell carcinoma treated with tyrosine kinase inhibitors: a systematic review and meta-analysis

PURPOSE

With the development of therapy and prognostic criteria for metastatic Renal Cell Carcinoma (mRCC), the prognostic value of serum albumin level has remained in dispute. The aim of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the role of pre-treatment albumin in predicting the prognosis of mRCC patients in the era of tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) treatments.

METHODS

The qualitative and quantitative synthesis was conducted of studies retrieved from PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane library from inception of these databases to July 19, 2020. The hazard ratio (HR) and its 95% confidence interval (CI) of overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) were extracted from studies comparing different levels of pre-treatment serum albumin (as a dichotomous or continuous variable) in mRCC patients treated with TKI agents.

RESULTS

Within 5,638 primitive records, 16 were eligible and 14 had adequate data for quantitative analysis (N = 2,863 participants). Random-effects meta-analysis showed that lower albumin was related to poorer OS (dichotomous: HR = 2.01, 95% CI: 1.64-2.46, P < 0.001, I² = 28.8%; continuous: HR =0.93, 95% CI: 0.86-1.00, P = 0.040, I² = 67.5%) and PFS (dichotomous: HR = 1.45, 95% CI: 1.04-2.01, P = 0.029, I² = 57.4%; continuous: HR = 0.89, 95% CI: 0.80-0.98, P = 0.023, I² = 93.3%).

CONCLUSION

Lower pre-treatment serum albumin level is an independent adverse predictor of prognosis of mRCC patients receiving TKI therapy.

REGISTRATION

PROSPERO ID: CRD42020196802 Sep. 2^nd, 2020.

The neonatal Fc receptor in cancer FcRn in cancer

Since the neonatal IgG Fc receptor (FcRn) was discovered, it was found to be involved in immunoglobulin recycling and biodistribution, immune complexes routing, antigen presentation, humoral immune response, and cancer immunosurveillance. The latest data show that FcRn plays a part in cancer pathophysiology. In various types of cancers, such as lung and colorectal cancer, FcRn has been described as an early marker for prognosis. Dysregulation of FcRn expression by cancer cells allows them to increase their metabolism, and this process could be exploited for passive targeting of cytotoxic drugs. However, the roles of this receptor depend on whether the studied cell population is the tumor tissue or the infiltrating cells, bringing forward the need for further studies.

Early post-operative serum albumin level predicts survival after curative nephrectomy for kidney cancer: a retrospective study

BACKGROUND

Previous studies have shown that albumin-related systemic inflammation is associated with the long-term prognosis of cancer, but the clinical significance of an early (≤ 7 days) post-operative serum albumin level has not been well-documented as a prognostic factor in patients with renal cell cancer.

METHODS

We retrospectively included patients hospitalized for kidney cancer from January 2009 to May 2014. First, the receiver operating characteristic analysis was used to define the best cut-off of an early post-operative serum albumin level in determining the prognosis, from which survival analysis was performed.

RESULTS

A total of 329 patients were included. The median duration of follow-up was 54.8 months. Patients with an early post-operative serum albumin level < 32 g/L had a significantly shorter median recurrence-free survival (RFS; 49.1 versus 56.5 months, P = 0.001) and median overall survival (OS; 52.2 versus 57.0 months, P = 0.049) than patients with an early post-operative serum albumin level ≥ 32 g/L. After adjusting for age, BMI, tumor stage, post-operative hemoglobin concentration, and pre-operative albumin, globulin, and hemoglobin levels, multivariate Cox regression showed that an early post-operative serum albumin level < 32 g/L was an independent prognostic factor associated with a decreased RFS (HR = 3.60; 95% CI,1.05-12.42 [months], P = 0.042) and decreased OS (HR = 9.95; 95% CI, 1.81-54.80 [months], P = 0.008).

CONCLUSION

An early post-operative serum albumin level < 32 g/L is an independent prognostic factor leading to an unfavorable RFS and OS. Prospective trials and further studies involving additional patients are warranted.

Prognostic value of the fibrinogen/albumin ratio (FAR) in patients with operable soft tissue sarcoma

Background

Coagulation and nutrition play important roles in cancer progression. The aim of the present study is to evaluate the prognostic value of the preoperative fibrinogen/albumin ratio (FAR) in surgical patients with soft tissue sarcoma (STS) and to compare this value with other inflammatory biomarkers. In addition, we investigated the relationship between FAR and the clinicopathological characteristics of STS patients.

Methods

We included 310 STS patients in this retrospective study. Kaplan-Meier curves, univariate and multivariate Cox proportional models were used in the prognostic analyses.

Results

According to the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis, the optimal FAR cut-off value was 0.0726. The FAR exhibited a greater area under the curve (AUC) value (0.680) than did the NLR and PLR. An elevated FAR (≥0.0726) was significantly associated with an old age, large tumor size, deep tumor location, high tumor grade, and advanced American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) stage.

Patients with an increased FAR had a shorter median survival time and a lower 5-year overall survival (OS) rate than did those with a low FAR (61.0 vs115.8 months, P < 0.001; 56.7% vs 82.4%, P < 0.001, respectively). Multivariate analysis indicated FAR (Hazard ratio (HR) 1.907, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.161–3.132, P < 0.001) to be an independent prognostic factor for OS, as were tumor depth, grade and PLR.

Conclusions

Preoperative FAR is associated with tumor progression and can be considered an independent factor for OS of resected STS patients.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (10.1186/s12885-018-4856-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.