Background/aim: The aim of this study was to elucidate the clinical significance of peripheral blood biomarkers, including absolute lymphocyte count (ALC), neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR) and C-reactive protein (CRP) in patients with estrogen receptor-positive human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative advanced breast cancer treated with the CDK4/6 inhibitors, abemaciclib and palbociclib.
Patients and methods: A total of 83 patients treated with fulvestrant plus abemaciclib or palbociclib were included in this study. Progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were compared in relation to baseline levels of ALC, NLR, PLR and CRP.
Results: The cut-off values of ALC, NLR, PLR, and CRP for PFS were determined from the receiver operating characteristic curve using the Youden index for area under the curve and set at 1,212/μl, 1.964, 170 and 0.220 mg/dl, respectively. In the abemaciclib-treated group, ALC-high patients showed significantly better PFS than ALC-low patients (p=0.0151) and multivariate analysis revealed that ALC was an independent prognostic factor for PFS (p=0.0085). In the palbociclib-treated group, there was no significant relationship between any peripheral blood biomarkers and PFS. In both treatment groups, ALC-high patients showed significantly better OS than ALC-low patients (p=0.0169 and 0.0290, respectively). Multivariate analysis revealed ALC was an independent prognostic factor for OS in both abemaciclib- and palbociclib-treated groups (p=0.0112 and 0.0202, respectively).
Conclusion: ALC is an independent prognostic factor for estrogen receptor-positive human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative advanced breast cancer patients treated with the CDK4/6 inhibitors abemaciclib and palbociclib.
Keywords: Advanced breast cancer; CDK4/6 inhibitor; absolute lymphocyte count; peripheral blood biomarker; prognostic factor.
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