Postoperative Adjuvant Treatment Strategy for Locally Advanced Rectal Cancer after Neoadjuvant Treatment

Table 2

Subgroup analysis of overall survival and disease-free survival.

	Subgroup	OS					DFS
		No. of study	HR	95% CI	for HR	Heterogeneity (, )	No. of study	HR	95% CI	for HR	Heterogeneity (, )
Oxaliplatin-based group versus fluorouracil-based group	Study design
	RCT	3	1.02	0.85-1.22	0.863	0.199, 38.0%	/	/	/	/	/
	nRCT	1	1.67	0.75-3.72	0.210	/	/	/	/	/	/
	Neoadjuvant treatment regimen
	Chemoradiation	4	1.04	0.87-1.24	0.656	0.201, 35.2%	6	0.99	0.76-1.27	0.906	0.016, 64.0%
	RT + FU	/	/	/	/	/	3	1.10	0.57-2.10	0.782	0.007, 79.6%
	ypStage
	ypStage II	2	1.24	0.68-2.27	0.491	0.263, 20.1%	3	0.82	0.59-1.13	0.225	0.262, 25.4%
	ypStage III	1	0.72	0.41-1.26	0.248	/	2	0.74	0.50-1.11	0.142	0.155, 50.5%
	Clinical stage
	Clinical stage II	2	1.07	0.65-1.75	0.793	0.299, 7.3%	1	0.95	0.59-1.52	0.831	/
	Clinical stage III	2	1.25	0.90-1.72	0.183	0.561, 0.0%	2	1.09	0.84-1.41	0.533	0.275, 16.0%
	ypN
	ypN0	2	1.26	0.68-2.36	0.466	0.275, 16.1%	3	0.83	0.64-1.08	0.16	0.316, 13.2%
	ypN1	2	1.05	0.54-2.05	0.888	0.474, 0.0%	2	1.05	0.52-2.10	0.897	0.411, 0.0%
	ypN2	1	0.42	0.18-0.97	0.042	/	2	0.75	0.33-1.70	0.492	0.070, 69.5%
Chemotherapy group versus observation group	Study design
	RCT	4	0.95	0.82-1.09	0.437	0.836, 0.0%	/	/	/	/	/
	nRCT	11	0.73	0.67-0.79	<0.001	0.038, 47.9%	/	/	/	/	/
	Neoadjuvant treatment regimen
	Chemoradiation	13	0.73	0.61-0.89	0.001	0.013, 52.8%	10	0.69	0.51-0.94	0.018	0.002, 65.8%
	RT + OX	2	0.49	0.20-1.24	0.133	0.396, 0.0%	2	0.41	0.21-0.78	0.007	0.437, 0.0%
	ypStage
	ypStage II	3	0.73	0.60-0.88	0.001	0.481, 0.0%	2	0.57	0.16-2.11	0.401	0.113, 60.2%
	ypStage III	2	0.78	0.65-0.95	0.011	0.126, 57.2%	/	/	/	/	/
	ypN
	ypN0	7	0.66	0.59-0.75	<0.001	0.839, 0.0%	/	/	/	/	/

RCT: randomized controlled trial; nRCT: nonrandomized controlled trial; RT: radiotherapy; OX: oxaliplatin-based chemotherapy; FU: fluorouracil-based chemotherapy; OS: overall survival; DFS: disease-free survival; HR: hazard ratio; CI: confidence interval; : degree of heterogeneity; ypStage: pathologic stage after receiving neoadjuvant chemotherapy; “/”: there is no relevant data.