To initially demonstrate the importance of BCL-3 expression for patient outcome in CRC, we carried out survival analysis in relation to BCL-3 expression by using a publicly available CRC dataset (GSE24551; https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/geo/query/acc.cgi?acc=GSE24551) and Progene V2 (Goswami and Nakshatri, 2014); results are displayed in Fig. 1A. Survival analysis in this dataset revealed that high BCL-3 expression was linked to significantly reduced survival when adjusted for tumour stage. This evidence concerns the gene BCL3 and neoplasm.