Baseline Low Prognostic Nutritional Index Predicts Poor Survival in Locally Advanced Nasopharyngeal Carcinomas Treated With Radical Concurrent Chemoradiotherapy

To retrospectively assess the impact of prognostic nutritional index (PNI) on survival outcomes of patients with locoregionally advanced nasopharyngeal carcinoma (LA-NPC) treated with concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CCRT).

This study incorporated 154 patients with LA-NPC who received exclusive cisplatinum-based CCRT. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was utilized for accessibility of pretreatment PNI cutoffs influencing survival results. The primary end point was the interaction between the overall survival (OS) and PNI values, while cancer-specific survival (CSS) locoregional progression-free survival (LR-PFS), distant metastasis-free survival (DMFS), and PFS were the secondary end points.

A rounded PNI cutoff value of 51 was identified in ROC curve analyses to exhibit significant link with CSS, OS, DMFS, and PFS outcomes, but not LR-PFS. Patients grouping per PNI value (≥51 [N = 95] vs <51 [N = 49]) revealed that PNI < 51 group had significantly shorter median CSS (P < .001), OS (P < .001), DMFS (P < .001), and PFS (P < .001) times than the PNI ≥ 51 group, and the multivariate results confirmed the PNI < 51 as an independent predictor of poor outcomes for each end point (P < .05 for each). The unfavorable impact of the low PNI was also continued at 10-year time point with survival rates of 77.9% versus 42.4%, 73.6% versus 33.9%, 57.9% versus 27.1%, and 52.6% versus 23.7% for CSS, OS, DMFS, and PFS, respectively. Additionally, we found that PNI < 51 was significantly associated with higher rates of weight loss >5% over past 6 months (49.2% versus 11.6%; P = .002) compared to PNI < 51 group.

Low pre-CCRT PNI levels were independently associated with significantly reduced CSS, OS, DMFS, and PFS outcomes in patients with LA-NPC treated with definitive CCRT.