Objective
Aortic stenosis (AS) is a progressive chronic disease like atherosclerosis and characterized by mechanical stress, endothelial damage, lipid accumulation, calcification and inflammation. Platelets play an important role in inflammation, thrombosis, and atherogenesis. Platelet to lymphocyte ratio (PLR) was proposed as a novel indirect marker of inflammation. We aimed to evaluate the relationship between PLR and AS.
Results
PLR was significantly increased in parallel to the severity of aortic stenosis (105.1 ± 30.1in control group, 136.6 ± 42.5 in the mild-to-moderate AS group and 183.9 ± 79.9 in the severe AS group, p<0.001). Also, there was significant positive correlation between PLR and maximum systolic transaortic gradient (r= 0.248, p<0.001), mean systolic transaortic gradient (r= 0.258, p<0.001). PLR was strongly correlated with C-reactive protein level and neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (r=0.352, p<0.001 and r=0.679, p<0.001, respectively). PLR level was found significantly and independently associated with the presence of AS (OR: 1.020, 95% CI: 1.009-1.031, p<0.001) (Table 1 and 2).
Conclusion
In this study, we found a significant relationship between PLR and AS. PLR is also found as the independent predictor for the presence of AS.
| Variables | OR (95 % CI) | P value |
|---|---|---|
| Age | 0.987 (0.963-1.011) | 0.285 |
| Hypertension | 1.144 (0.509-2.573) | 0.745 |
| Total cholesterol | 0.998 (0.987-1.008) | 0.659 |
| PLR | 1.020 (1.009-1.031) | <0.001 |
| NLR | 1.638 (1.010-2.655) | 0.045 |
| CRP | 1.166 (1.026-1.326) | 0.019 |
