ESM1 has been widely explored in various cancers, including prostate cancer, hepatocellular carcinoma, and head and neck squamous cell carcinoma; it also has prognostic value in esophageal cancer (Calderaro et al., 2019; Xu et al., 2019; Cui et al., 2021; Pan et al., 2021). This evidence concerns the gene ESM1 and head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.