Treatment strategies for locally advanced rectal cancer are changing significantly. The treatment recommended in German guidelines for locally advanced tumors of neoadjuvant radio(chemo)therapy (RChT), followed by surgery and, if necessary, adjuvant therapy, are increasingly be abandoned in favor of the following concepts: (i) prolonged neoadjuvant therapy (i.e. “more chemotherapy before resection”, referred to as total neoadjuvant therapy, TNT); (ii) organ preservation in patients with …