PrognostiCheck®

Prognostic Role of Phase Angle in advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer(NSCLC)

Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) accounts for about 80% of all lung cancers. Malnutrition is a frequent manifestation in patients with advanced NSCLC and is a major contributor to morbidity and mortality. Malnutrition is characterized by changes in cellular membrane integrity and alterations in fluid balance. As a result, measurement of body composition is an important component of overall nutritional evaluation in cancer patients.

A frequent manifestation of advanced lung cancer is malnutrition, timely identification and treatment of which can lead to improved patient outcomes. Bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) is an easy-to-use and non-invasive technique to evaluate changes in body composition and nutritional status.

Here is an excerpt from the study that was conducted by D.Gupta and Team to investigate the prognostic role of BIA-derived phase angle in advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

A case series of 165 stages IIIB and IV NSCLC patients treated at our center. The Kaplan Meier method was used to calculate survival. Cox proportional hazard models were constructed to evaluate the prognostic effect of phase angle, independent of stage at diagnosis and prior treatment history.

93 were males and 72 females. 61 had stage IIIB disease at diagnosis while 104 had stage IV. The median phase angle was 5.3 degrees (range = 2.9 – 8). Patients with phase angle <= 5.3 had a median survival of 7.6 months (95% CI: 4.7 to 9.5; n = 81), while those with > 5.3 had 12.4 months (95% CI: 10.5 to 18.7; n = 84); (p = 0.02). After adjusting for age, stage at diagnosis and prior treatment history we found that every one degree increase in phase angle was associated with a relative risk of 0.79 (95% CI: 0.64 to 0.97, P = 0.02).

It was concluded from the study that phase angle acts as an independent prognostic indicator in patients with stage IIIB and IV NSCLC. Nutritional interventions targeted at improving phase angle could potentially lead to an improved survival in patients with advanced NSCLC.

PrognostiCheck® is a scoring system that interprets a measured electrical value i.e Phase angle , that illustrates the health of the cell membrane. It can be used to provide critically important information to patients, their families and physicians on survival in cancer and all other diseases.

By seeing what is happening in the cell-wall-membrane the results provide better information sooner that supports, compliments and increases the value of the physicians decision dataset.