SynthesisFrontiers in oncology2024
The prognostic value of lymph node ratio for thyroid cancer: a meta-analysis.
Synthesis in Frontiers in oncology, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed.
- Central lymph node ratio predicting lateral metastasis in pediatric thyroid cancer: a retrospective study.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2026Article
- Laterocervical Lymph Node Metastases in Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma: Predictive Factors for Recurrence and Oncological Outcome.Journal of personalized medicine · 2025Article
- The Initial Risk Stratification System for Differentiated Thyroid Cancer: Key Updates in the 2024 Korean Thyroid Association Guideline.Endocrinology and metabolism (Seoul, Korea) · 2025Review
- Pathological metastatic lymph node density (ND) predicts early recurrence in papillary thyroid cancer patients after curative resection.Gland surgery · 2025Article
- Long-term efficacy of lobectomy for stage T1 papillary thyroid carcinoma with varying degrees of lymph node metastasis.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
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Abstract
Background: The prognostic value of lymph node ratio (LNR) has been proved in several cancers. However, the potential of LNR to be a prognostic factor for thyroid cancer has not been validated so far. This article evaluated the prognostic value of LNR for thyroid cancer through a meta-analysis. Methods: A systematic search was conducted for eligible publications that study the prognostic values of LNR for thyroid cancer in the databases of PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane, and Web of Science up until October 24, 2023. The quality of the eligible studies was evaluated by The Newcastle-Ottawa Assessment Scale of Cohort Study. The effect measure for meta-analysis was Hazard Ratio (HR). Random effect model was used to calculate the pooled HR and 95% confidence intervals. A sensitivity analysis was applied to assess the stability of the results. Subgroup analysis and a meta-regression were performed to explore the source of heterogeneity. And a funnel plot, Begg's and Egger's tests were used to evaluate publication bias. Results: A total of 15,698 patients with thyroid cancer from 24 eligible studies whose quality were relatively high were included. The pooled HR was 4.74 (95% CI:3.67-6.11; P<0.05) and a moderate heterogeneity was shown (I2 = 40.8%). The results of meta-analysis were stable according to the sensitivity analysis. Similar outcome were shown in subgroup analysis that higher LNR was associated with poorer disease-free survival (DFS). Results from meta-regression indicated that a combination of 5 factors including country, treatment, type of thyroid cancer, year and whether studies control factors in design or analysis were the origin of heterogeneity. Conclusion: Higher LNR was correlated to poorer disease free survival in thyroid cancer. LNR could be a potential prognostic indicator for thyroid cancer. More effort should be made to assess the potential of LNR to be included in the risk stratification systems for thyroid cancer. Systematic review registration: https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/PROSPERO/display_record.php?RecordID=477135, identifier CRD42023477135.
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