AXL and hepatocellular carcinoma: The multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that patients with HCC recurrence had the highest mortality (HR: 2.87, 95% CI: 2.01‐4.01, P < 0.001), followed by those with microvascular invasion (HR: 1.85, 95% CI: 1.08‐3.19, P = 0.026), HBV‐related HCC (HR: 1.77, 95% CI: 1.21‐2.56, P = 0.003), and high Axl expression in tumors (HR: 1.66, 95% CI: 1.41‐1.97, P < 0.0001); these data are summarized in Table 3.