The Role of Lymph Node Ratio in Predicting Survival in Patients with Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Background: This study aimed to evaluate the role of lymph node ratio (LNR) in the prediction of Overal Survival (OS) of patients with Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma (ESCC). Methods: Patients with ESCC who underwent radical esophagectomy and radical lymph node dissection were entered into the study. The survival rate of patients was determined using the Kaplan–Meier estimator. Also, the effect of LNR and other variables on the OS of patients was assessed applying COX proportional hazards regression model. Based on its mean, LNR was divided into two groups of ≤0.25 and >0.25. Results: In total, 116 patients were entered into the study. The univariate and multivariate analyses showed that LNR was an independent prognostic factor for the prediction of the OS of patients with ESCC. An increase of LNR more than 0.25 led to an increase in the mortality risk by 1.57 times. Also, the five-year survival of patients was 26% with LNR≤0.25 and 5% with LNR>0.25. Conclusion: LNR can be used as an independent prognostic factor in determining and predicting the OS of patients with ESCC. There was a relationship between the increase of this factor and the worsening of patients’ OS.