Patient background and laboratory variables associated with the efficacy of nivolumab after chemoradiotherapy in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma. (2025)

Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is refractory to multidisciplinary treatment. Immunotherapy targeting programmed cell death protein 1 has shown promise in recent years; however, predicting its therapeutic efficacy remains difficult. The present study aimed to identify the factors associated with treatment response in patients receiving nivolumab after radical chemoradiotherapy for ESCC and to predict treatment efficacy based on these factors. A total of 22 patients were classified into partial response (PR) + stable disease (SD) and progressive disease (PD) groups based on their response to nivolumab. Factors associated with the treatment response were analyzed, including clinical stage, patient background and pre-treatment blood test results. Among the 22 patients, nine and 13 w