ArticleCancers2026
Evaluation of PD-L1 Expression and Systemic Inflammatory Blood Cell Ratios as Prognosticators in Advanced Lung, Breast and Head and Neck Cancers.
Article in Cancers, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Baseline Neutrophil-to-Lymphocyte Ratio and Two-Year Incident Distant Metastasis in Stage I-III Lung Cancer: A Single-Center Retrospective Cohort Study.Journal of clinical medicine · 2026Article
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12 authors.
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Abstract
introductionImmunotherapy with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) targeting the PD-1/PD-L1 axis has become an established treatment strategy across various malignancies. In this context, PD-L1 expression plays a key role in the clinical management of cancer patients. However, the prognostic significance of PD-L1 expression remains inconsistent across different cancer types. This study aimed to evaluate the prevalence of PD-L1 expression in three cancer types and to examine its association with key clinicopathological parameters, systemic inflammatory markers and patient outcomes.
methodsA retrospective cohort of 141 patients with lung, breast and head and neck cancers diagnosed between 2016 and 2021 was analysed. PD-L1 expression was analysed by immunohistochemistry using clone 22C3 and the scoring system for positivity was determined according to standard clinical scoring practices for each tumour type. Systemic inflammatory markers, including the platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR), were calculated from pre-treatment blood counts. Correlation and survival analyses were performed to evaluate the associations between PD-L1 expression levels, clinicopathological characteristics and prognosis. Bioinformatics analyses using GeneMania, STRING and TIMER (v.3) databases were conducted to explore functional enrichment, protein-protein interactions and immune-cell infiltration associated with PD-L1 expression.
resultsPD-L1 positivity (≥1%) was observed in 56.75% of lung cancer cases, 44% of breast cancer cases and 92.85% of head and neck cancer cases. PD-L1 expression alone was not significantly associated with overall survival across the cancer cohorts. However, it was significantly associated with PLR in the lung cancer cohort (
conclusionsDespite its high expression in advanced solid tumours, PD-L1 showed limited prognostic value in our cancer cohort. In contrast, systemic inflammatory markers particularly PLR, emerged as a potential indicator of clinical outcome. Our data suggest that integrating PD-L1 status with systemic inflammatory markers may improve outcome prediction and help inform therapeutic decision-making in patients with advanced malignancies.
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