RESUMO
BACKGROUND: Recently, many studies explored the role of inflammation parameters such as neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) in the prognosis of urinary cancers, but the results were not consistent. METHODS: We carried out a meta-analysis of published studies to assess the prognostic value of NLR in patients with urinary cancers. Hazard ratio (OR) with 95% confidence interval (CI) was used to assess the association of NLR and OS and RFS/CSS. RESULTS: The pooled results showed that high NLR was a poor predictor for OS with HR of 1.81 (95%CI: 1.48-2.21; Pheterogeneityâ=â0.005) and RFS/CSS (HRâ=â2.07, 95% CI: 1.65-2.6; Pheterogeneityâ=â0.849). Subgroup analyses revealed that high NLR yielded a worse OS in RCC (HRâ=â1.9, 95%CI: 1.47-2.45; Pheterogeneityâ=â0.003) and a poor RFS/CSS in RCC (HRâ=â1.83, 95%CI: 1.35-2.48; Pheterogeneityâ=â0.709), bladder cancer (HRâ=â2.2, 95%CI: 1.27-3.8; Pheterogeneityâ=â0.447) and urothelial carcinoma (HRâ=â2.58, 95%CI: 1.66-4.01; Pheterogeneityâ=â0.784). CONCLUSION: Our results showed that NLR could act as a significant biomarker in the prognosis of urinary cancers.