Value of nutritional risk screening-2002 in evaluating nutritional status of patients with esophageal cancer undergoing radiotherapy

Objective To apply Nutritional Risk Screening-2002(NRS-2002) to perform primary screening for nutritional risk in patients with esophageal cancer who undergo radiotherapy, and assess their nutritional status, and to investigate the value of NRS-2002 in such patients. Methods A total of 97 patients who were diagnosed with esophageal cancer and underwent radiotherapy in Zhejiang Cancer Hospital from January 2010 to April 2014 were analyzed retrospectively. The Kaplan-Meier method was applied to analyze the difference in survival, and the chi-square test and the Pearson correlation analysis were applied to analyze the correlation between NRS-2002 score and blood parameters. Results Of all patients, 26.8% had nutritional risk before radiotherapy, which gradually increased with the progress of radiotherapy. The 1-year overall survival rates of the patients with NRS-2002 scores of ≤3 and ≥4 on admission were 91.1% and 61.9%, respectively (P=0.010). As for the patients with the highest NRS-2002 scores of ≤2 and ≥3 during treatment, the 1-year overall survival rates were 94.2% and 77.5%, respectively (P=0.012). As for the patients with the lowest NRS-2002 scores of ≤3 and ≥4 during treatment, the 1-year overall survival rates were 91.3% and 54.5%, respectively (P=0.018). The NRS-2002 score was correlated with prealbumin on admission and at week 1 of radiotherapy (P=0.000 and 0.002), and the NRS-2002 score was correlated with albumin at week 3 of radiotherapy (P=0.036). The multivariate analysis showed that the TNM stage of esophageal cancer and the highest NRS-2002 score during treatment were the independent prognostic factors in esophageal cancer (P=0.001 and 0.005). Conclusions The patients with esophageal cancer undergoing radiotherapy have high nutritional risk, and NRS-2002 score is the independent prognostic factor in these patients and can be used as a tool for primary screening for nutritional risk. Key words: Nutritional risk screening; Esophageal neoplasms/radiotherapy; Blood nutrition maker; Prognosis