HGF and cancer: For cancer death, age, HGF, and total cholesterol (inversely) remained significant (Table 6): after adjustment for confounding factors, the HRs by HGF quartile were 1.22 (95% CI, 0.53–2.83) for Q2, 1.19 (0.50–2.83) for Q3, and 2.21 (1.03–4.76) for Q4.