After the publication of the article, the authors have realized that the affiliation presented for the joint co‑author listed on the paper (Jian‑Ren Tu) was incorrect. The correct author list (and affiliations) should therefore have been published as follows: Yu‑Hua Xu1*, Jian‑Ren Tu2*, Tian‑Tian Zhao3, Shi‑Guang Xie3 and Sheng‑Bo Tang4. 1Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Jiangxi Chest Hospital, Nanchang, Jiangxi 330006; 2Department of Oncology, Jiangxi Cancer Hospital, Nanchang, Jiangxi 330029; Departments of 3Respiratory Medicine and 4Medical Oncology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, Nanchang, Jiangxi 330006, P.R. China. *Contributed equally. The authors apologize for their oversight, and for any inconvenience that this has caused. [the original article was published in International Journal of Oncology 54: 295‑305, 2019; DOI: 10.3892/ijo.2018.4629].