highly significantP <0.05
Using this median number as the cutoff point, 10 patients with preoperative CDX2 pCTCs >13.5 and only three patients with preoperative CDX2 pCTCs ⩽13.5 had recurrent or metastatic CRC after follow-up for 42 months and the association between preoperative CDX2 pCTCs and recurrent or metastatic CRC was highly significant ( χ 2 test: χ 2 =4.73; P <0.05).