Systemic inflammation is an independent predictive marker of clinical outcomes in mucosal squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck in oropharyngeal and non-oropharyngeal patients

Kellie A. Charles; Benjamin D. W. Harris; Carol R. Haddad; Stephen J. Clarke; Alex Guminski; Mark Stevens; Tristan Dodds; Anthony J. Gill; Michael Back; David Veivers; Thomas Eade

doi:10.1186/s12885-016-2089-4

Table 1 Patient demographics

From: Systemic inflammation is an independent predictive marker of clinical outcomes in mucosal squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck in oropharyngeal and non-oropharyngeal patients

Characteristic	All patients (N = 145)^a	Oropharyngeal (n = 76)^a	Non-oropharyngeal (n = 69)^a	p value*
Age, median years (range)	63 (28–86)	59.5 (32–83)	67 (28–86)	<0.01
Sex, n (%)				0.5
Male	115 (79)	62 (82)	53 (77)
Female	30 (21)	14 (18)	16 (23)
ECOG PS, n (%)				<0.001
0	102 (70)	64 (84)	38 (55)
1	32 (22)	10 (13)	22 (32)
2	10 (7)	2 (3)	8 (12)
Missing	1 (1)	-	1 (1)
Smoking status, n (%)				0.2
Non-smoker	44 (30)	24 (32)	20 (29)
Ex-smoker	61 (42)	36 (47)	25 (36)
Current smoker	37 (26)	15 (20)	22 (32)
Missing	3 (2)	1 (1)	2 (3)
Tumour site, n (%)				<0.001
Lip and oral cavity	25 (17)	0 (0)	25 (36)
Nasopharynx	8 (6)	0 (0)	8 (12)
Oropharynx	76 (52)	76 (100)	0 (0)
Hypopharynx	12 (8)	0 (0)	12 (17)
Larynx	24 (17)	0 (0)	24 (35)
Tumour stage, n (%)				0.05
T1	35 (24)	24 (32)	11 (16)
T2	52 (36)	29 (38)	23 (33)
T3	36 (25)	15 (19)	21 (30)
T4	22 (15)	8 (11)	14 (20)
Nodal stage, n (%)				<0.001
N0	44 (30)	11 (14)	33 (48)
N1	36 (25)	22 (29)	14 (20)
N2	60 (41)	41 (54)	19 (28)
N3	5 (3)	2 (3)	3 (4)
AJCC stage, n (%)				0.2
I	9 (6)	4 (5)	5 (7)
II	35 (24)	18 (24)	17 (25)
III	74 (51)	44 (58)	30 (43)
IV	27 (19)	10 (13)	17 (27)
p16 tumour status, n (%)				<0.001
Negative	48 (51)	7 (16)	41 (80)
Positive	47 (49)	37 (84)	10 (20)
Missing	50	32	19
Treatment, n (%)				<0.001
Radiotherapy	17 (12)	10 (13)	7 (10)
Postoperative radiotherapy	29 (20)	3 (4)	26 (38)
Chemoradiotherapy	88 (61)	61 (80)	27 (39)
Postoperative chemoradiotherapy	11 (8)	2 (3)	9 (13)
Neutrophils, median counts (range) x 10⁹ cells/L	5.10 (1.10 - 11.90)	4.60 (1.10 - 11.90)	5.30 (2.10 - 11.80)	0.2
Lymphocytes, median counts (range) x 10⁹ cells/L	1.60 (0.20 - 10.70)	1.60 (0.40 - 3.40)	1.70 (0.20 - 10.70)	0.1
NLR, median counts (range) x 10⁹ cells/L	3.11 (0.41 - 29.75)	3.11 (1.30 - 29.75)	3.11 (0.41 - 16.00)	0.9
NLR, n (%)				0.7
Low (≤5)	116 (80)	60 (79)	56 (81)
High (>5)	29 (20)	16 (21)	13 (19)

Abbreviations: ECOG PS Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status, AJCC American Joint Committee on Cancer and NLR neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio
^*, appropriate statistical test (Students t-test, Mann Whitney-U, χ2 test or Fishers exact test) conducted between oropharyngeal and non-oropharyngeal cancer patient excluding missing values and ^a, missing values indicated in table

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