Müzeyyen ERYILMAZ, Ilkay KESKİNEL, Lara TÜRKELİ
Southern Clinics of Istanbul Eurasia - 2026;37(3):273-278
Objective: Smoking is a deleterious habit with profound health consequences, often resulting in systemic inflammation that contributes to chronic diseases. We aimed to investigate how different types of exposure (active or passive smoking) affect systemic inflammatory responses, compared to non-smokers. Methods: This retrospective, single-center study included 306 healthy individuals categorized according to smoking status, with a predominantly female population (253 females and 53 males). Hematologic inflammatory markers, including the systemic immune inflammation index (SII), systemic inflammation response index (SIRI), neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio (NLR), and platelet/lymphocyte ratio (PLR) were assessed alongside C-reactive protein (CRP) levels. A CRP level >=3 mg/L was considered to define systemic inflammation. Results: Among active smokers, SIRI was the only marker that showed a statistically significant diagnostic value for identifying elevated CRP levels (AUC=0.662, 95% CI:0.522-0.802, p=0.021), whereas the remaining indices were not significant in any group. The optimal cut-off value for SIRI was 1.50, with a sensitivity of 38.1% and a specificity of 95.8%. In passive smokers and non-smokers there was no significant association was observed between hematologic indices and CRP levels. Conclusions: SIRI may be a helpful and easily accessible parameter for assessing the inflammatory response in active smokers. Although its discriminatory performance was modest, its derivation from routine complete blood count parameters may support its use as an adjunctive marker in clinical evaluation.
