Tianjin Medical Journal ›› 2023, Vol. 51 ›› Issue (2): 207-212.doi: 10.11958/20221393

• Clinical Research • Previous Articles     Next Articles

The risk factor analysis for immune-related adverse events in non-small cell lung cancer patients treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors and their relationship to effectiveness

XU Jinhui1(), XU Guangjuan1, DUAN Lufen1, LIU Kaili2, ZHOU Qin1, SUN Jiantong1, DING Xinyuan1,()   

  1. 1 Department of Pharmacy, the Affiliated Suzhou Hospital of Nanjing Medical University/Suzhou Municipal Hospital, Suzhou 215002, China
    2 Department of Oncology, the Affiliated Suzhou Hospital of Nanjing Medical University/Suzhou Municipal Hospital, Suzhou 215002, China
  • Received:2022-08-31 Revised:2022-10-22 Published:2023-02-15 Online:2023-02-24
  • Contact: E-mail:aladdine@163.com

Abstract:

Objective To explore risk factors for immune-related adverse events (irAEs) in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) and to investigate the relationship between irAEs and effectiveness. Methods A total of 162 NSCLC patients treated with ICIs were retrospectively enrolled. Baseline demographic and clinical characteristics, peripheral blood biomarkers and irAEs were collected and evaluated. Logistic regression analysis was performed to identify risk factors of irAEs. The relationships between irAEs, overall response rate (ORR), progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were also evaluated. Results Eighty-three patients experienced 130 times of irAEs and 12 patients had severe irAEs. The most observed irAEs were skin toxicity (34.6%), immune-related pneumonitis (21.5%), and the most common severe irAEs was immune-related pneumonitis (5.4%). A higher pretreatment absolute lymphocyte count (ALC) was an independent risk factor for irAEs in all patients (OR=3.195, 95%CI: 1.341-7.610, P=0.009). They were also independent risk factors for irAEs in patients treated with ICIs only (OR=5.613, 95%CI: 1.109-28.411, P=0.037) and in patients treated with chemoimmunotherapy (OR=2.901, 95%CI: 1.102-7.633, P=0.031). Receiver operating characteristic curve analyses revealed that the ALC level yielded an AUC of 0.713 (95%CI: 0.633-0.792) with 71.1% sensitivity and 62.0% specificity at the cut-off level of 1.25×109/L to predict the risk of irAEs. Compared with the non-irAEs group,the objective response rate (ORR) was higher in the irAEs group (38.6% vs. 21.5%, χ2=5.567, P<0.05). Patients in the irAEs group had a longer PFS (329 d vs. 206 d, Log-rank χ2= 5.256, P<0.05) as well as OS (690 d vs. 434 d;Log-rank χ2= 4.670, P<0.05). Conclusion An increased baseline ALC level is identified as an independent risk factor for the development of irAEs in NSCLC patients. Moreover, the occurrence of irAEs is significantly associated with the improvement of ORR, PFS and OS.

Key words: carcinoma, non-small-cell lung, immune checkpoint inhibitors, lymphocytes, survival analysis, immune-related adverse events

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