Novel Prognostic Model Based on Immune Signature for Head and Neck Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Background. Deciphering the immune characteristics within tumors and identifying the immune signals related to the prognostic factor are helpful for the treatment and management of tumor patients. However, systematic analysis of immune signatures in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) remains largely unstudied. Methods. A total of 718 immune-related genes were extracted from RNA sequencing data from 519 HNSCC patients in the TCGA database, and survival analysis with integrated bioinformatics analyses was performed to build the final predictive prognosis model. Results. The 178 survival-associated genes (P<0.05) participated in important immune functions, including immune cell activation and migration. Multivariate regression analysis using 93 genes (P