VIM and esophageal squamous cell carcinoma: Our data revealed that the poor overall survival rate of ESCC patients 2 years after surgery were significantly correlated with either low miR-146a expression (cut off value: < 0.8) or high vimentin expression (cut off value: > 1.8) but not with miR-146a + vimentin (Fig. 5d, e and Additional file 1: Table S2).