A nomogram for the prediction of prognosis in patients with distant metastases of nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Abstract

Background: Patients with metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) have heterogeneous survival outcomes. This study aimed to establish an effective prognostic nomogram for patients with NPC with distant metastases using easily determined factors. Methods: The nomogram was based on a retrospective study of 103 patients with metastatic NPC at the First Affiliated Hospital of Xiamen University during January 2009-March 2016. Nomogram performance was evaluated using a concordance index (C-index) and assessed using calibration plot. Bootstraps with 1,000 resamples were applied to these analyses. Results: In univariate and multivariate Cox proportional hazards model analyses, chemotherapy, metastatic liver involvement, number of tumor metastases, N stage and derived neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio correlated with overall survival (OS). The recurrence probability calibration curve indicated good agreement between nomogram-based predictions and actual observations. For OS predictions, the nomogram had a C-index of 0.824 (95% confidence interval, 0.74-0.91). The stratification by nomogram score of patients into different subgroups showed significant distinction. Conclusion: This novel nomogram comprises factors that are easily determined at most hospitals and can predict survival in patients with distant metastases of NPC. This model can precisely estimate the survival of individual patients and identify subgroups of patients requiring specific therapeutic strategies.