“…Several phase II studies of 5-fluorouracil-based preoperative chemoradiotherapy for locally advanced rectal cancer have reported R0 resection rates of 60 -85% (Chan et al, 1993;Minsky et al, 1993;Keilholz et al, 1995;Videtic et al, 1998;Küchenmeister et al, 2000;Rödel et al, 2000) including pathologic complete response (pCR) rates of 5 -20%. Even in low rectal tumours, sphincter-preserving surgery was possible after preoperative chemoradiotherapy in 27 -86% of the patients (Grann et al, 1997;Hyams et al, 1997;Maghfoor et al, 1997;Küchenmeister et al, 2000). Moreover, randomised trials have shown that neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy improves local control compared with postoperative chemoradiation in primary resectable tumours (Roh et al, 2001;Sauer et al, 2004).…”