Is neutrophyl to lymphocyte ratio really a useful marker for all grades of degenerative aortic stenosis?

OBJECTIVE
Inflammatory processes play an important role in cardiac valve calcification and ossification. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between the neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and degenerative aortic stenosis (AS).

METHODS
A total of 220 patients with AS and 158 healthy individuals who were a control group were included in the study. The NLR was calculated by dividing the number of neutrophils by number of lymphocytes in peripheral blood samples.

RESULTS
The study group consisted of 220 AS patients (mild/moderate group: n=110; severe group: n=110) and 157 healthy controls. Both the mild/moderate AS group (p<0.001) and the severe AS group (p<0.001) had a significantly higher NLR compared with the control group. The NLR in the severe AS group was significantly higher than that of the mild/moderate AS group (p<0.001). The groups were similar with respect to other baseline characteristics. A receiver operating characteristic curve analysis yielded a strong predictive ability of NLR for the presence of AS (Area under the curve=0.930; 95% CI [confidence interval], 0.898–0.963; p<0.001). A cut-off value of 2.310 for NLR had a sensitivity and specificity of 80.4% and 92.4%, respectively, for the presence of AS. In multivariate logistic regression analysis, NLR (Odds ratio: 43.8; 95% CI, 14.7–130.7) was the only independent predictor of AS.

CONCLUSION
The discriminative performance of NLR for AS is high. NLR is strongly and independently associated with AS.