Hi I don’t know if anyone can help but I’ve read a lot on here of people having surgery however I’ve been advised they are looking at radiotherapy/chemotherapy for me. Has anyone had experience of treatment without the surgery please? Thank you
Hi Wenglish Chemoradiotherapy tends to be used for rectal cancers and can be effective at shrinking the tumour before surgery, When the surgeon removes the tumour they also remove a clear surrounding area of bowel to make sure they’ve got it all away ( known as a clear margin) If the tumour is further around the bowel then there’s lots of bowel to play with but with rectal tumours they need to have enough bowel left to rejoin so the smaller the tumour is, the better.
Some people have been fortunate enough to have a complete response to chemo radiotherapy and are still ‘no evidence of disease’ to this day - see Jogeys post below.
Others have had a complete response but then the cancer has returned later. I had a 75% shrinkage of the tumour followed by surgery. The radiotherapy is often 5 weeks of daily treatment (mon-fri) at a hospital then a mild dose of chemo in tablet form at home
