Abstract
Pancreatic cancer is associated with a poor prognosis and an overall 5-year survival rate of less than 5%. This is a serious issue that was left behind in the 21th century. Recently, an improvement in treatment is being achieved by progress in postoperative adjuvant chemotherapy. However, only 50% of cases receive adjuvant chemotherapy. To clarify the effectiveness of neoadjuvant chemotherapy, it is necessary to evaluate all patients of pancreatic cancer intending to undergo surgery by intention-to-treat analysis. It is possible that neoadjuvant chemotherapy may contribute an improvement in the prognosis as a whole for pancreatic cancer. We now have initiated a phase III randomized controlled trial to determine the efficacy of neoadjuvant chemotherapy with both gemcitabine and S-1. In the future, neoadjuvant therapy should be considered as a standard treatment for resectable pancreatic cancer.
