Our study revealed that upregulated TIMP1 level was significantly correlated with the regional lymph node metastasis (p = 0.033), distant metastasis (p = 0.039), vascular invasion (p = 0.024) and the AJCC stage (p = 0.026), while no association was found between TIMP1 expression and age, gender, tumor location, T-classification or differentiated degree. Here, TIMP1 is linked to neoplasm.