Association of Neutrophil to Lymphocyte Ratio and Pulmonary Hypertension in Sarcoidosis Patients

Mehdi Mirsaeidi; Esmaeil Mortaz; Hesham R Omar; Enrico M Camporesi; Nadera Sweiss

Association of Neutrophil to Lymphocyte Ratio and Pulmonary Hypertension in Sarcoidosis Patients

Tanaffos. 2016;15(1):44-7.

Authors

Mehdi Mirsaeidi¹, Esmaeil Mortaz², Hesham R Omar³, Enrico M Camporesi⁴, Nadera Sweiss⁵

Affiliations

¹ Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, Sleep and Allergy, Department of Medicine, University of Miami, FL, USA.
² Division of Pharmacology, Utrecht Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences, Faculty of Science, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands; Chronic Respiratory Diseases Research Center, National Research Institute of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (NRITLD), Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
³ Chronic Respiratory Diseases Research Center, National Research Institute of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (NRITLD), Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
⁴ Professor of Surgery/Anesthesiology, Professor of Molecular Pharmacology and Physiology, University of South Florida, FGTBA and TEAM Health, Tampa, Florida, USA.
⁵ Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, Sleep and Allergy, Department of Medicine, University of Illinois at Chicago, IL, USA.

PMID: 27403178
PMCID: PMC4937761

Abstract

Background: The neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) has emerged as a new marker of inflammation associated with the severity of several respiratory and cardiac diseases.

Materials and methods: We investigated whether the degree of systemic inflammation in sarcoidosis patients as measured by the NLR is associated with pulmonary hypertension (PH).

Results: A NLR > 3.5 occurred with a significantly higher frequency in sarcoidosis patients with PH (50% vs. 24%, P=0.016) yielding a sensitivity of 50%, specificity of 78%, positive predictive value (PPV) of 41.9% and negative predictive value (NPV) of 81.4% and remained independently associated with PH in multivariate analysis (OR: 3.254, 95% CI: 1.094-9.678, P=0.034).

Conclusion: We conclude that level of inflammation in sarcoidosis patients may be associated with the development of PH. Owing to the relatively good specificity and NPV, NLR may be a good negative test, which is a simple, inexpensive and widely available in office-based setting to predict the risk of PH in sarcoidosis patients.

Keywords: Blood; Diagnosis; Marker; Pulmonary hypertension; Sarcoidosis.