Consistent with previous reports [22], [23], serum VEGF levels showed a positive correlation with tumor size (r = 0.430, P<0.001) andstage determined by various systems, such as the AJCC TNM (ρ = 0.202, P = 0.02), BCLC (ρ = 0.315, P<0.001), the Cancer of the Liver Italian Program (CLIP) score (ρ = 0.208, P = 0.02) and Okuda (ρ = 0.260, P = 0.002). Here, VEGFA is linked to cancer.