Neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio is associated with coronary microvascular dysfunction in type 2 diabetes mellitus patients

Abstract Aims Our study is aimed to investigate the relationship between neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and coronary microvascular dysfunction (CMD) in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) patients. Methods We retrospect the consecutive medical files of 160 T2DM patients and recorded their clinical information and laboratory findings. Patients were divided into CMD group (n = 87) and non-CMD group (n = 73). We compared the NLR values of the two groups. Meanwhile we also observed the prevalence of CMD at different NLR levels. Then, logistic regression and ROC analysis were performed. Results NLR value of CMD group was significantly lower than non-CMD group (2.01 ± 0.74 vs 2.53 ± 0.69, P＜0.001). Prevalence of CMD in low (NLR ≤ 1.53, n = 30), medium (1.53   2.20, n = 77) group were 90%, 61.1%, and 39.2% respectively. The prevalence of CMD significantly increased as NLR level decreased. After adjusting potential related factors, NLR was still significantly correlated with CMD (OR = 0.295, 95 %CI:0.162–0.539, P  Conclusions Our results showed that NLR is associated with CMD in T2DM patients, and the prevalence of CMD may increase as NLR level decrease.