Based on the results by X-tile, the 198 patients who had sufficient tumor samples for IHC were grouped as followed: (1) low-LDLR group (HSCORE ≤ 60, n = 145, 73.2%, Fig. 1a), and (2) high-LDLR group (HSCORE >60, n = 53, 26.8%, Fig. 1b) (Additional file 1: Figure S1). Here, LDLR is linked to neoplasm.