The relationship between the level of NMLR on admission and the prognosis of patients after cardiopulmonary resuscitation: a retrospective observational study

BACKGROUND: The inflammatory immune response is involved in the pathophysiology of the post-cardiac arrest syndrome and leads to high mortality. The admission (neutrophil + monocyte) to lymphocyte ratio (NMLR) can help us to assess the immune inflammatory status of patients. We aimed to identify factors that affect the prognosis and explore the association between NMLR and the prognosis of patients after cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). METHODS: This is a retrospective study based on the MIMIC-IV database. We assessed patients admitted to the ICU after cardiopulmonary resuscitation, included demographic characteristics, peripheral blood cell count and blood gas indicators for the first time after admission to the ICU, developed a multivariate COX proportional-hazards model to explore prognostic factors, and divided patients into High NMLR and Low NMLR groups by cutoff values of NMLR. Propensity score matching (PSM) was used to adjust confounding factors. RESULTS: A total of 955 patients were included in the analysis, with 497 surviving and 458 dying during the follow-up period. In a multivariate Cox proportional-hazards model, age (RR 1.007, p = 0.0411), NMLR levels (RR 1.003, p = 0.0381), lactate (RR 1.097, p < 0.001) and hematocrit (RR 1.101, p < 0.001) were independent risk factors for patient death following CPR. Patients were divided into a high NMLR group (> 14.2) and a low NMLR group (≤ 14.2) based on the optimal threshold for NMLR. Compared to low NMLR group, high NMLR group had higher total vasoactive drugs and lower 28-day survival. After PSM, there were no differences in baseline characteristics. The high NMLR group still had a higher mortality rate (p = 0.001), lower 28-day survival (p = 0.001) and shorter length of stay (p = 0.005) compared to the low NMLR group. CONCLUSIONS: Age, NMLR levels, lactate levels and hematocrit were independent risk factors for death in patients after CPR. NMLR > 14.2 was associated with higher mortality and was a potential predictor of clinical outcome in patients after CPR. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s40001-023-01407-w.