Predicting the need for prophylactic gastrostomy in major head and neck cancer surgery: The PEG score

Background: To elaborate a preoperative score to predict the necessity of enteral nutrition at 28 days postoperatively in patients undergoing head and neck surgery.

Methods: A total of 424 patients with oral cavity, oropharyngeal, laryngeal, and hypopharyngeal carcinoma were retrospectively enrolled and analyzed to identify preoperative predictors of prolonged postsurgical enteral feeding which were used to create a prediction model with an easy-to-use nomogram.

Results: Five preoperative variables (body mass index, previous radiotherapy, preoperative dysphagia, type of surgery, flap reconstruction) were found to be independent predictive factors and were used to create a prediction model named PEG score together with the related nomogram. Accuracy, F1, and the area under the curve (AUC) were 0.74, 0.83, and 0.74. Different decision thresholds can be used to vary the sensitivity and specificity.

Conclusions: The PEG score showed high prediction performances for modeling the need for enteral nutrition at 28 days postoperatively. Prospective studies are needed to define a personalized nutrition protocol.