用患者自报与临床数据,无须造影就能预测头颈癌吞咽障碍风险。
Dysphagia Risk Stratification in Head and Neck Cancer via Two-Stage PRO-Clinical Stacking

- 两阶段集成模型融合自报症状与临床变量进行风险评估。
- 单次就诊数据即可预测,独立分析每个症状的贡献。
- 适合临床随访中快速筛查高危患者,无需复杂设备。
吞咽困难是头颈癌治疗后的严重远期副作用,但及时识别高危患者仍具挑战。目前金标准为动态影像评估(CTCAE-DIGEST),虽已验证有效,却需专业设备、人员及患者配合,难以常规应用。相比之下,患者报告结局(PRO)成本低、易采集,适合作为筛查信号。然而,如何将自报结果转化为可操作的干预决策仍不明确。本研究提出一种单次就诊的PRO-临床预测框架,引入可解释的两阶段堆叠模型,仅使用自报症状与结构化临床变量,无需造影即可预测吞咽功能损伤风险。结果表明,个体MDADI条目响应包含超越综合评分的预测信息;可解释性分析揭示了与吞咽障碍相关的症状模式与临床风险因素。研究支持将结构化PRO-临床整合作为头颈癌生存期管理中实用、无影像的吞咽障碍风险分层方法。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Dysphagia is a debilitating late effect of head and neck cancer (HNC) treatment, yet timely identification of at-risk patients remains challenging in survivorship care. Definitive assessment relies on videofluoroscopic imaging, as captured by the Dynamic Imaging Grade of Swallowing Toxicity (CTCAE-DIGEST), which, while validated, requires specialized equipment, trained personnel, and significant patient burden, limiting its routine use in surveillance. Patient-reported outcomes (PROs), by contrast, are low-cost, scalable, and easily collected at any clinical encounter, making them an attractive alternative signal for identifying patients who may warrant further evaluation. However, a clear clinical framework for translating PRO responses into actionable interventions is still evolving. In particular, uncertainty remains regarding when a patient's self-reported symptom burden should prompt escalation of care. This study addresses this gap by formulating a single-visit PRO-clinical prediction framework and introducing a clinically interpretable two-stage stacking model to predict swallowing impairment risk using PRO responses and structured clinical variables, without requiring videofluoroscopic imaging. The proposed framework quantifies the independent contributions of patient-reported symptoms and clinical factors within a unified and interpretable risk assessment model. Our findings demonstrate that individual MDADI responses contain predictive information beyond that captured by composite or global summary scores, while interpretability analyses reveal symptom patterns and clinical risk factors associated with swallowing impairment. Together, these results support the use of structured PRO-clinical integration as a practical, imaging-free approach for dysphagia risk stratification in HNC survivorship.
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