STAT3 and metastatic malignant neoplasm in the lymph nodes: Using Kaplan-Meier univariate analysis, six factors were found to have statistically significant associations with the OS time of patients with GAC following curative surgery, including STAT3, p-STAT3 (Fig. 3A), HIF-1α, VM (Fig. 3B), status of lymph node metastasis and degree of differentiation (P<0.05).