Background: Recent studies have revealed that preoperative fibrinogen and the neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) are associated with poor outcome in gastric cancer (GC). We aimed to evaluate whether the fibrinogen and the NLR score had a consistent prognostic value for resectable GC.
Methods: We analyzed 1,293 consecutive patients who underwent curative surgery for GC. The F-NLR score was 2 for patients with hyperfibrinogenemia (>400 mg/dL) and elevated NLR (≥5.0), 1 for those with one abnormal index, and 0 for those with no abnormal indices.
Results: We found that higher F-NLR scores were associated with larger tumor size, deeper tumor invasion and more lymph node metastasis (all P<0.05). In a multivariate analysis, F-NLR independently predicted postoperative survival (P<0.001). When stratified by tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) stage, the prognostic value of F-NLR was still maintained for stages I-II (P<0.001) and stage III (P=0.003). Of note, F-NLR also effectively stratified overall survival (OS) irrespective of age, adjuvant chemotherapy administration, tumor location and histological grade (all P<0.05). Furthermore, F-NLR and TNM stratified 5-year OS from 61% (F-NLR 0) to 15% (F-NLR 2) and from 92% (stage I) to 37% (stage III), respectively. Utilizing both F-NLR and TNM, 5-year OS ranged from 93% (F-NLR 0, TNM I) to 6% (F-NLR 2, TNM III).
Conclusion: The F-NLR score independently predicts outcomes in GC patients after curative surgery. Therefore, it should be implemented in routine clinical practice for identifying more high-risk patients.
Keywords: F-NLR score; adjuvant chemotherapy; curative surgery; gastric cancer; prognosis.