Glucose to Lymphocyte Ratio as a Prognostic Marker in Patients With Resected pT2 Gallbladder Cancer

We designed a clinical application of glucose to lymphocyte ratio (GLR) as it might be a sensitive parameter to determine the glucose metabolism and behavior of the cancer (i.e., its aggressiveness), and the immunologic status of a patient with cancer. Thus, we investigated the association of GLR with the overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) of patients with T2 gallbladder (GB) cancer after curative-intent surgery.

The medical records of patients with T2 GB cancer who underwent surgery were retrospectively reviewed. The clinicopathologic characteristics, preoperative complete blood counts, fasting blood glucose, albumin, cholesterol, and follow-up information were collected.

A total of 197 patients were included in the study. In multivariate analysis, high GLR (>69.3) was associated with poor OS (HR = 15.249, 95% CI: 4.090-56.849, P = 0.0001) along with R1 status (HR = 1.755, 95% CI: 0.033-0.910, P = 0.033), >3 metastatic lymph nodes (HR = 2.809, 95% CI: 1.403-5.625; P = 0.004), and lymphovascular invasion (HR = 8.041, 95% CI: 2.881-22.442; P = 0.0001). Moreover, high GLR (HR = 3.666, 95% CI: 1.145-11.737, P = 0.029), adjuvant chemotherapy (HR = 6.306, 95% CI: 1.921-20.699; P = 0.002), lymphovascular invasion (HR = 5.464, 95% CI: 1.783-16.746; P = 0.003), and high-grade tumor (HR = 2.143, 95% CI: 1.042-4.407; P = 0.038) were independently associated with DFS.

Preoperative GLR is an independent predictor of OS and DFS in T2 GB cancer. Further studies are required to validate these findings.