Impact of BMI on the Survival of Renal Cell Carcinoma Patients Treated with Targeted Therapy: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

It is unclear whether obese renal cell carcinoma (RCC) patients treated with targeted therapy have better survival. We conducted this meta-analysis to assess the prognostic significance of body mass index (BMI) in RCC patients treated with targeted therapy. We systematically searched PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science by November 17, 2021. We calculated effect outcomes using random-effects and fixed-effects models. Fifteen articles were identified. We found that RCC patients treated with targeted therapy with BMI over 25 obtained better overall survival (OS) (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.69, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.58–0.82, I² = 75.5%, p < 0.001) and progression-free survival (PFS) (HR = 0.71, 95%CI = 0.55–0.92, I² = 69.7%, p = 0.006) than patients with BMI below 25. Obese (BMI over 30) patients had remarkably better OS (HR = 0.77, 95%CI = 0.70–0.85, I² = 0.0%, p = 0.439) and PFS (HR = 0.86, 95%CI = 0.77–0.97, I² = 0.0%, p = 0.934) than patients with BMI below 25. Overweight (BMI over 25 but below 30) patients also had better OS (HR = 0.86, 95%CI = 0.79–0.93, I² = 17.7%, p = 0.295) and PFS (HR = 0.82, 95%CI = 0.74–0.90, I² = 0.0%, p = 0.904) than patients with BMI below 25. When using BMI as continuous variable, patients with high BMI also obtained significantly better OS (HR = 0.92, 95%CI = 0.88–0.96, I² = 0.0%, p = 0.806). Therefore, higher BMI was associated with greater OS and PFS in RCC patients treated with targeted therapy.

Authors’ Contributions

GZ conceived and designed the study. JJ, YY and FG collected and analyzed the data. JJ and LL wrote the manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final manuscript.

Data Availability Statement

The datasets used and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Disclosure Statement

The authors declare they have no competing interests.

Additional information

Funding

This work was partly funded by the Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province (ZR2021MH354), Medical and health research program of Qingdao (2021-WJZD170) and the Clinical Medicine + X Project of The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University (No. QDFY + X2021029).