Ito M, Yajima S, Suzuki T, et al. - Researchers assessed the clinicopathological as well as the prognostic influence of serum programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) levels in 150 patients who underwent radical resection for esophageal cancer. They used the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay kit to assess preoperative serum PD-L1 levels. Two groups were defined based on a cutoff level of 65.6 pg/mL. These groups were compared in terms of clinicopathological features and prognoses, by performing univariate and multivariate analyses. They although noted significant links between serum PD-L1 levels and clinicopathological variables, a significant link of serum PD-L1 level with high neutrophil counts, high CRP levels, low albumin levels, and high squamous cell carcinoma antigen levels was also revealed. In this patient population, they found a high preoperative level of serum PD-L1 was a prognostic factor for poor overall survival.