Table 1.

Baseline characteristics of include studies and methodological assessment.

Authors (year)	Region	Study design	Tumor type	Treatment	Number of patients	Age (years)	Cutoff value (AST/ALT)	Analysis method	Outcomes	Follow-up (months)	Quality score
Bezan 2015 (18)	America	Retrospective	Non-metastatic	Surgery	698	Median 65.4 (55.8–73.4)	1.26	Multivariate	OS	Median 60	8
Canat 2017 (19)	Turkey	Retrospective	Non-metastatic	Surgery	298	Median 61 (22–86)	1.5	Univariate	OS, CSS	Mean 37.8 ± 22.3	7
Gu 2017 (23)	China	Retrospective	Non-metastatic	Surgery	185	Mean 56.1 ± 11.8	1.0	Univariate	OS	Median 30.2 (12.1–48.4)	8
Ishihara 2017 (24)	Japan	Propensity score matching	Metastatic	Surgery	118	Median 65	1.24	Multivariate	OS, CSS	Mean 21.0 ± 24.3	9
Lee 2017 (25)	Korea	Propensity score matching	Non-metastatic	Surgery	2965	Median 55 (47–65)	1.5	Multivariate	OS, CSS	Median 37 (24–73)	9
Kang 2018 (26)	Korea	Retrospective	Metastatic	TKI	360	Median 58 (51–67)	1.2	Multivariate	OS, CSS	Median 29 (24.1–33.9)	9
Kim 2018 (27)	Korea	Retrospective	Metastatic	TT	158	Mean 58.6 ± 10.6	1.38	Univariate	OS,	NR	7
Ikeda 2020 (28)	Japan	Retrospective	Non-metastatic	Surgery	243	Median 61 (55–67)	1.42	Multivariate	CSS	Median 60 (25–103)	9
Kang 2020 (29)	Korea	Retrospective	Non-metastatic	Surgery	670	Median 55 (48–61)	1.0	Univariate	OS, CSS	Median 59 (41–81)	8
Laukhtina 2020 (30)	Europe and America	Retrospective	Metastatic	Surgery	613	Median 57 (50–64)	1.2	Multivariate	OS, CSS	Median 31 (16–58)	9
Janisch 2021 (31)	Germany	Retrospective	Metastatic	TKI	220	Median 64 (57–71)	1.08	Multivariate	OS	Median 28 (10–58)	9

TKI, tyrosine kinase inhibitor; TT, targeted therapy; AST, aspartate transaminase; ALT, alanine transaminase; OS, overall survival.

CSS, cancer-specific survival; PFS, progression-free survival; MFS, metastasis-free survival; NR, not report.