Diagnostic value of alpha-fetoprotein combined with neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio for hepatocellular carcinoma

BACKGROUND: To investigate the diagnostic performance of alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) and neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) as well as their combinations with other markers. METHODS: Serum aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), AFP and levels as well as the numbers of neutrophils and lymphocytes of all enrolled patients were collected. The NLR was calculated by dividing the number of neutrophils by the number of lymphocytes. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was conducted to determine the ability of each marker and combination of markers to distinguish HCC and liver disease patients. RESULTS: In total, 545 patients were included in this study. The area under the ROC curve (AUC) values for AFP, ALT, AST, and NLR were 0.775 (0.738-0.810), 0.504 (0.461-0.547), 0.660 (0.618-0.699), and 0.738 (0.699-0.774) with optimal cut-off values of 24.6 ng/mL, 111 IU/mL, 27 IU/mL, and 2.979, respectively. Of the four biomarkers, AFP and NLR showed comparable specificity (0.881 and 0.858) and sensitivity (0.561 and 0.539). The combination of AFP and NLR showed the highest AUC (0.769) with a significantly higher sensitivity (0.767) and a lower specificity (0.773) compared to AFP or NLR alone, and it had the highest sum of sensitivity and specificity (1.54) among all combinations. In patients with AFP < 20 ng/mL, the NLR showed the highest AUC and combination with other markers did not improve the diagnostic accuracy. CONCLUSIONS: Our data indicate that the combination of AFP and NLR offers better diagnostic performance than either marker alone for differentiating HCC from liver disease, which may benefit clinical screening.