2Department of Emergency Medicine, Health Sciences University, Antalya Training and Research Hospital, Antalya, Turkey DOI : 10.26663/cts.2019.00022 Viewed : 6225 - Downloaded : 2663 Background: Although the NLR and PLR are cheap and widely available biomarkers, literature regarding their usage in trauma patients is scarce. It seemed to us interesting to evaluate the prognostic value of the NLR and PLR for trauma patients. In this manner, we selected a small group of trauma patients with sternal fractures and aimed to investigate their correlation with the serum NLR and PLR. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study investigating the clinical value of these cheap and widely available biomarkers in trauma patients.
Materials and Methods: We designed a retrospective study examining the utility of NLR and PLR in estimating trauma severity in sternum fracture patients who admitted to our hospital between January 2013 and April 2018. Patients were divided into two groups: isolated sternum fracture group (36 patients with sternal fracture and without any complications in thorax or other system and/or only 1 or 2 rib fractures) and complicated sternum fracture group (19 patients with sternal fracture and with associated complications in thorax or other systems). Injuries were not graded but referred as severe according to the associated complications in thorax or other systems. The key clinical parameters, including NLR and PLR were compared among the groups.
Results: Based on the ROC curve, the best NLR cut-off value to predict complicated sternum fracture group patients was 2.1, with 88.9% sensitivity and 28% specificity, whereas the best PLR cut-off value was 123.8, with 72% sensitivity and 68% specificity.
Conclusions: The results may indicate a clinically useful marker that can be easily and reliably measured from a blood sample to predict outcome of trauma patients with sternal fractures.
Keywords : sternum fracture, neutrophil, lymphocyte, platelet, ratio