Pre-treatment neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio may be associated with the outcome in patients treated with everolimus for metastatic renal cell carcinoma.

BACKGROUND: Everolimus is a mammalian target of rapamycin inhibitor approved for the treatment of metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC). We aimed to assess the association between pre-treatment neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and the outcome of patients treated with everolimus for mRCC.

METHODS: Ninety-seven patients with mRCC were treated with everolimus till April 2013 in our institutions. Patients were stratified in two groups with NLR >3 (Group A) vs <3 (Group B). Progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were estimated using Kaplan-Meier method. Gender, age, Motzer prognostic group, PFS on first-line therapy, neutrophilia and NLR were included in the Cox analysis to investigate their prognostic relevance.

RESULTS: Median OS and PFS were 10.6 and 5.3 months, respectively. Median OS was 12.2 months in Group A and 24.4 months in Group B (P=0.001). Median PFS was 3.4 months in Group A and 9.9 months in Group B (P<0.001). At multivariate analysis, only Motzer prognostic group and NLR were independent prognostic factors for OS and PFS.

CONCLUSION: Pre-treatment NLR is an independent prognostic factor for patients with mRCC treated with second- or third-line everolimus. This should be investigated and validated in prospective studies.