The preoperative controlling nutritional status (CONUT) score is an independent prognostic marker for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.

The controlling nutritional status (CONUT) score was developed as a nutritional score that can be calculated from the serum albumin level, total cholesterol concentration, and total lymphocyte count. The aim of this study was to assess the prognostic factors for the overall survival (OS) of pancreatic cancer patients following a curative resection and to compare the CONUT score with other prognostic factors to demonstrate its utility. Between January 2007 and December 2015, 307 consecutive patients who underwent surgery for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) were divided into a low CONUT group (LC; CONUT score ≤ 3) and a high CONUT group (HC; CONUT score ≥ 4) according to the results of their preoperative blood examination. The clinicopathological characteristics and prognosis of the patients were evaluated retrospectively. The prognostic factors of PDAC were detected using multivariate analyses. The LC and HC groups included 279 and 28 patients, respectively. The overall survival of the LC group was better than that of the HC group (LC, median survival time [MST] 27.9 months, 5-year survival rate 33.4%, respectively; HC, 13.9 months, 6.7%, p < 0.001). The multivariate analyses showed that age ≥ 70 years, lymph node metastasis, absence of postoperative adjuvant chemotherapy, CA19-9 ≥ 200 U/ml, and a preoperative CONUT score ≥ 4 were independently associated with poor survival. However, the Glasgow prognostic score, neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio, platelet-lymphocyte ratio and prognostic nutritional index were not significant factors. The CONUT score may be useful for predicting the long-term survival of patients with PDAC.