Survival of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer is correlated with the proportion of patients who receive all the three active drugs in the course of the disease, but not with the proportion of patients who receive any second-line therapy. In a sequential strategy, not all patients who progress after first-line chemotherapy are able to receive second-line treatment. Moreover, there is a correlation between the response rate to chemotherapy and the postchemotherapy radical resection rate of metastases.
Therefore, a way to improve the outcome of metastatic colorectal cancer patients could be to administer a first-line regimen containing the three active agents.
