Nine of the studies used identical statistical methods: (1) receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curves for censored survival data to identify the optimum cut-off value for predicting outcome; [30] and (2) Cox proportional hazard regression analysis to evaluate independent risk factors for disease progression and OS [31] after adjustment for age, gender, HBV/HCV infection, AFP level, Child–Pugh class, BCLC stage, tumour nodularity, and vascular invasion. Here, AFP is linked to neoplasm.