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Guidelines & Advice
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Preoperative or Postoperative Therapy for the Management of Patients with Stage II or III Rectal Cancer

Version: 3 ID: 2-4 Mar 2019
Type of Content: Guidelines & Advice, Clinical
Document Status: In-Review
Authors:
Gastrointestinal Cancer Disease Site Group

Patient Population

These recommendations apply to adult patients with clinically resectable or resected stage II or III rectal cancer.

Intended Guideline Users

Clinicians and healthcare providers involved in the management or referral of adult patients with rectal cancer.

Research Questions

  1. Following appropriate preoperative staging tests, should patients with resectable clinical stage II or III rectal cancer be offered preoperative radiotherapy (RT) (with or without chemotherapy [CT])?
  2. What is the role of postoperative RT and/or CT for patients with resected stage II or III rectal cancer who have not received preoperative RT, in terms of improving survival and delaying local recurrence?
pdf download Summary (PDF) (275.03 KB)
pdf download Full Report (PDF) (1.98 MB)