The development of novel molecular-targeted therapies is mandatory. One of such experimental approaches is active-specific immunotherapy (1,2). A prerequisite for the best outcome of all molecular-targeted treatment strategies is the very accurate selection of patients enrolled in the protocols. HLA class I and class II play a definite role in immune recognition of tumors. They dictate the T-cell mediated response through the specific presentation of peptides to the effectors cells. Therefore, the determination of HLA phenotype might be a good selection criterion to identify those patients who are most likely to respond to immune-based treatments (3). Moreover, HLA phenotype could play an unexpected and independent role in the incidence and prognosis of tumors (4,5). During the recruitment of patients, determined by advanced disease and a minimum expected survival of at least 6 mo, we found a cluster of patients with a high incidence of HLA-A2 phenotype, compared to the healthy population. We extended our investigation to see if this finding was an isolated local phenomenon, or more broad-based. Finally, we looked for a correlation between HLA genotype and cancer mortality rates.