The value of complete blood count parameters in predicting preterm delivery.

OBJECTIVE: The association between inflammation and threatened preterm labor (TPL) is well known. The aim of this study was to investigate a possible relation between TPL and new defined systemic inflammatory markers, neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR), lymphocyte to monocyte ratio (LMR) and platelet to lymphocyte ratio (PLR). PATIENTS AND METHODS: Fifty-three healthy pregnant women as the control group and 55 pregnant women diagnosed with TPL as the study group were included in this prospective controlled study. The study group was divided into two groups according to the gestational age at delivery: pregnant with TPL who delivered < 37 weeks and pregnant with TPL who delivered ≥ 37 weeks. The clinical and laboratory data were compared among the groups. RESULTS: LMR was found to be significantly higher in patients complicated with TPL who delivered prematurely when compared to the women whose pregnancies continued to term (p = 0.02). Furthermore, a significant negative correlation was also observed between the gestational week at delivery and LMR in women who delivered < 37 weeks. DISCUSSION: We demonstrated that LMR was significantly increased in pregnant women with preterm birth and threatened preterm labor than healthy subjects. CONCLUSIONS: Although increased LMR levels were demonstrated to be associated with preterm birth and threatened preterm labor to be able to extrapolate these findings into clinical daily practice, further studies are needed.