Retrospective Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2017. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastrointest Surg. Apr 27, 2017; 9(4): 97-102
Published online Apr 27, 2017. doi: 10.4240/wjgs.v9.i4.97
Trends with neoadjuvant radiotherapy and clinical staging for those with rectal malignancies
Sanjay S Reddy, Beth Handorf, Jeffrey M Farma, Elin R Sigurdson
Sanjay S Reddy, Jeffrey M Farma, Elin R Sigurdson, Department of Surgical Oncology, Fox Chase Cancer Center, Philadelphia, PA 19111, United States
Beth Handorf, Department of Biostatistics, Fox Chase Cancer Center, Philadelphia, PA 19111, United States
Author contributions: Reddy SS designed, performed the research, and wrote the paper; Handorf B performed the statistical analysis; Farma JM and Sigurdson ER edited and supervised the project.
Institutional review board statement: This study was reviewed and approved by the institution.
Informed consent statement: Patients were not required to give informed consent to the study because the analysis used anonymous clinical data that was obtained from a national cancer database.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no financial relationships to disclose.
Data sharing statement: There is a potential risk of confidentiality loss during the study. The following steps will be taken to protect the confidentiality of the information obtained throughout the study: All protected information will be de-identified at the start of the research project; all original documents will be maintained on a computerized system in their original format. Data points will be maintained on a locked file in the office of Beth Handorf; only the investigators will have access to the electronic medical records; all investigators are HIPAA and NIH trained with regard to the protection of human research participants.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Sanjay S Reddy, Assistant Professor, Department of Surgical Oncology, Fox Chase Cancer Center, 333 Cottman Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19111, United States. sanjay.reddy@fccc.edu
Telephone: +1-201-2906739 Fax: +1-215-7282773
Received: September 30, 2016
Peer-review started: October 10, 2016
First decision: November 10, 2016
Revised: January 3, 2017
Accepted: February 18, 2017
Article in press: February 20, 2017
Published online: April 27, 2017
Processing time: 206 Days and 8.5 Hours
Core Tip

Core tip: This paper serves to show how changes in practice patterns evolve over time. The adoption of these practice patterns differ across institution type, and the role of appropriate clinical staging is often not included. In order for proper treatments to be initiated, we not only need data substantiated by level one evidence, but we also need proper clinical staging so we can ensure appropriate therapies are delivered to these patients.