Pathological responses after angiogenesis or EGFR inhibitors in metastatic colorectal cancer depend on the chemotherapy backbone

Background: Optimal preoperative treatment before colorectal cancer metastases (CRCM) resection remains unclear. This study evaluated pathological responses (pR) in CRCM resected after chemotherapy alone or combined with angiogenesis or epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) inhibitors. Methods: Pathological response was retrospectively evaluated on 264 resected metastases from 99 patients. The proportion of responding metastases after different preoperative treatments was reported and compared. Patient's progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were compared based on pR. Results: The combination of anti-angiogenics with oxaliplatin-based chemotherapy resulted in more pR than when they were combined with irinotecan-based chemotherapy (80% vs 50% P