Perioperative Chemotherapy in Treating Patients With Colon Cancer That Can Be Surgically Removed

OBJECTIVES: I. To determine if adjuvant therapy with one week of continuous 5-FU given within 24 hours of a curative colon resection followed by 6 months of 5-FU/leucovorin is effective in prolonging the disease-free survival and increasing overall survival in patients with Dukes' B3 or C colon cancer, when compared to patients who are treated with 5-FU/leucovorin only. II. 1. To determine if a week of perioperative continuous 5-FU affects disease-free survival and overall survival in patients with Dukes' B2 colon cancer. OUTLINE: This is an open-label, randomized phase III study. Patients undergo curative colon resection via laparotomy. Patients are randomized to 1 of 2 arms in a 1:1 ratio. Arm I (Perioperative 5-FU): Within 24 hours of the colon resection, patients receive perioperative 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) intravenously (IV) over 24 hours for 7 days. Arm II (No perioperative 5-FU): Patients receive no perioperative fluorouracil. After surgery, patients with stage I, stage IIA, or stage IV colon cancer are immediately removed from study. Patients with stage IIB, IIC, or III colon cancer are re-registered within 35 days postoperatively. Beginning 21-35 days after surgery, patients with stage IIC or III disease receive leucovorin calcium IV bolus immediately followed by 5-FU IV bolus on days 1-5. Courses repeat every 28 days for a total of 6 courses in the absence of disease progression or unacceptable toxicity. Patients with stage IIB disease do not receive adjuvant 5-FU and leucovorin calcium. Patients are followed every 3 months for 2 years, then every 6 months for 2 years, and then annually until 15 years. PROJECTED ACCRUAL: A total of 800-2,000 patients (at least 400 per treatment arm) will be accrued for this study over 2-3 years.