The prognostic role of programmed cell death-ligand 1 expression in non-small cell lung cancer patients: An updated meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND

Programmed cell death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) seemed to be associated with the outcomes of non-small cell lung cancer. However the prognostic role of PD-L1 expression among NSCLC remained unclear and inconsistent. The aim of the study set out to evaluate the correlation between PD-L1 expression and the prognosis of patients that developed NSCLC.

METHODS

Identified literatures were extracted of various electronic databases and a meta-analysis was performed to evaluate the prognostic role of PD-L1 among NSCLC patients.

RESULTS

Totally 25 studies from 11 countries containing 5861 patients were included in the meta-analysis. The pooled hazard ratios (HRs) for overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) were 1.176 (95% CI: 1.016-1.361, P = 0.029) and 1.170 (95% CI: 0.984-1.392, P = 0.076), respectively. High PD-L1 expression on NSCLC tissue was also related with worse OS among Asian patients (HR = 1.381, 95% CI: 1.127-1.629, P = 0.002), adenocarcinomas (HR = 1.899, 95% CI: 1.306-2.762, P = 0.001) and poor PFS in non-Asian patients (HR = 1.695, 95% CI: 1.158-2.480, P = 0.002). Sensitivity analysis indicated that removal of any particular included literature won't affect the pooled results. Publication bias among the studies was not significant neither.

CONCLUSIONS

PD-L1 expression is a prognostic factor related with poor survival among patients that developed NSCLC.