. 2020 Nov 3;14(1):100927. doi: 10.1016/j.tranon.2020.100927

Table 1.

Univariate associations of pathological responses with clinicopathological factors, TILs, and TMEFs in 43 patients with breast cancer who received preoperative chemotherapy.

Variable		Pathological response		P
		Decreased (G1, n = 24)	Increased (≥G2, n = 19)
Median age, years (range)		49 (27–69)	52 (30–68)	NS^a
Stage, n	II	14	7	NS^a
	III	6	11
	IV	4	1
Subtype, n	Luminal	21	6	<0.01^b
	HER-2-positive	1	11
	TN	2	2
Treatment regimen, n	Taxanes/FEC	11 (Tz: 1)	3 (Tz: 1)	NS^b
	FEC/taxanes	9	11 (Tz: 9)
	EC/taxanes	4	4 (Tz: 1)
	ddEC/taxanes	0	1
Tz, n	Tz–	23	8	<0.01^b
	Tz+	1	11
Nuclear grade, n	1	2	0	NS^a
	2	4	3
	3	18	16
Ki-67 positivity, n	<15%	6	2	NS^a
	15–35%	6	4
	>35%	12	13
TILs, n (Pre-chemo)	<5%	16	9	NS^b
	≥5%	8	10
TILs, n (Post-chemo)	<5%	18	13	NS^b
	≥5%	6	6
Increase in TILs, n (%)		3 (12.5%)	3 (15.7%)	NS^c
Median levels (range)		27.5 (12–49)	28.0 (6–62)	NS^a
Pre-chemo pNK cells		32.5 (8–61)	34.0 (3–58)	NS^a
Post-chemo pNK cells P		NS^d	NS^d
Pre-chemo PLR		196.28 (75–1151.66)	159.74 (78.01–329.55)	NS^a
Post-chemo PLR P		268.59 (166.84–541.25) <0.01^d	189.44 (106.08–462.50) NS^d	0.02^a
Median TMEF levels (range)
Pre-chemo NK cells		0 (0–12.50)	0.04 (0–50.26)	NS^a
Post-chemo NK cells P		0.38 (0–88.51) 0.02^d	20.23 (0–163.40) <0.01^d	0.04^a
Pre-chemo IL-6		0.44 (0–49.37)	0.18 (0–42.92)	NS^a
Post-chemo IL-6		1.20 (0–412.72)	7.08 (0–2710.88)	NS^a
P		NS^d	0.02^d

TIL tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte, TMEF tumor microenvironmental factor, G1 grade 1, G2 grade 2, NS not significant, HER-2 human epidermal growth factor receptor 2, TN triple negative, FEC 5-fluorouracil/epirubicin/cyclophosphamide, Tz trastuzumab, EC epirubicin/cyclophosphamide, ddEC dose-dense epirubicin/cyclophosphamide, pNK peripheral natural killer, PLR platelet-lymphocyte ratio, NK natural killer, IL-6 interleukin 6.

Mann–Whitney test.

chi-squared test.

Fisher's exact test.

Wilcoxon signed-rank sum test.