Neutrophil-platelet ratio as a predictor of acute kidney injury in severe COVID-19

Abstract

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is one of the most seen complications of coronavirus-2019 (COVID-19) infection. Patients with AKI caused by COVID-19 likely have higher neutrophil counts and lower platelet and lymphocyte levels. Therefore, the predictive value of many inflammation indexes calculated from the total blood count has been investigated to predict the AKI in COVID-19. According to our clinical experience, we thought that neutrophilia and thrombocytopenia may be more common in the development of AKI. For this reason, this study aimed to evaluate the predictive value of the neutrophil-to-platelet ratio (NPR) for AKI in severe COVID-19 patients. This retrospective study included 334 severe COVID-19 patients followed up in the intensive care unit (ICU). Predictive factors for AKI were analyzed. ROC curve analysis was performed to determine the inflammation indexes' cutoff values for the AKI prediction. Multivariate analyses were performed to determine correlations between the inflammation indexes and AKI. In this study, AKI was determined at the rate of 43% (n:145). Independent risk factors affecting AKI were determined to be age (HR = 1.047, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.021-1.072, P < .001), the need for invasive mechanical ventilation (HR = 3.003, 95% CI: 1.645-5.481, P = .001) and the need for vasopressor (HR = 8.111, 95% CI: 3.786-17.375, P < .001). The optimal cutoff values predicting AKI were determined to be 3.9 for the NPR (AUC = 0.679, 95% CI: 0.622-0.737, P < .001) with 71.7% sensitivity and 61.9% specificity, 16.1 for the neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) (AUC = 0.634, 95% CI: 0.575-0.694, P < .001) with 65.5% sensitivity and 56.1% specificity, and 3872.5 × 109L for the systemic inflammatory index (SII) (AUC = 0.566, 95% CI: 0.504-0.629, P = .038) with 60% sensitivity and 55.6% specificity. In the regression model, only NPR values above the cutoff were related to AKI (HR = 3.817, 95% CI: 1.782-8.177, P = .001). The NPR has more predictive value than the NLPR, NLR, and SII in developing AKI in severe COVID-19 patients in the ICU. NPR is a new helpful index that can help clinicians predict early AKI in critical COVID-19.

Figure 1.

Study flow diagram.

Figure 2.

ROC curves of inflammatory markers. CRP: C-reactive protein; NLR: neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio; SII: systemic inflammatory index; NLPR: neutrophil-to-lymphocyte*platelet ratio; NPR: neutrophil-to-platelet ratio.

Figure 3.

Path analyses of markers. AKI: acute kidney injury, CRP: C-reactive protein, NLR: neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio, SII: systemic inflammatory index, NLPR: neutrophil-to-lymphocyte*platelet ratio, NPR: neutrophil-to-platelet ratio.