Junyi Tan ¹ Xiaofeng Shi ¹ Yinhuan Pi ^1* Mingque Xiang ^2* Tianju Li ^2*

• ¹ Department of Infectious Diseases, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing, China
• ² Infection Department, the Nine People's Hospital of Chongqing, Chongqing, China

Background: Although malnutrition is associated with poor prognosis in Pulmonary Tuberculosis (PTB) patients, no nutrition-based prediction model has been established for PTB. Herein, we explored the clinical utility of common nutrition scores in predicting the prognosis of PTB patients. Methods: We retrospectively collected clinical baseline data from 167 patients with secondary PTB who had not previously received anti-TB treatment. Subsequently, we determined the CONUT score, PNI index, and NPS score and evaluated the treatment efficacy using changes in lung lesions revealed by the chest CT scan. The Area Under the Receiver Operating Characteristic (AUROC) curve was used to quantify the predictive values of CONUT, PNI, and NPS scores for anti-TB efficacy in new-onset PTB patients, and the critical CONUT, PNI, and NPS values were determined using the Youden Index. We also performed univariate and multivariate analyses of prognostic factors in PTB patients to determine the nutrition scores and other clinical factors associated with the prognosis of patients with the new-onset PTB.The Youden Index revealed that the critical CONUT score value fori patients with PTB was 4.5, with a sensitivity of 72.2% and specificity of 96.6%. In contrast, the critical cut-off values of the PNI index and the NPS score were 39.825 and 3.5, respectively. Univariate analysis of the predictors of poor prognosis in PTB patients showed that patients with diabetes, COPD, pneumonia, and hypoproteinemia (which were risk factors) had a poor prognosis (p<0.05).