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The use of preoperative chemoradiotherapy is standard treatment for patients with T3 or node-positive rectal cancer. An infusional schedule of 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) chemotherapy is favored given trial results showing survival benefits and therapy tolerance, but recent data suggest that oral capecitabine might be as effective as infusional 5-FU when each is combined with radiotherapy (JW Oncol Hematol Jul 19 2011).
To examine this issue further, investigators in Germany conducted an open-label, multicenter, noninferiority, randomized, controlled, phase III trial of capecitabine versus 5-FU in the neoadjuvant and adjuvant settings in 401 patients with endorectal ultrasound or pathologic stage T3 or 4 or node-positive rectal cancer. Most patien…