[Chemotherapy for elderly patients with colorectal cancer].

Uncertainty exists about whether elderly patients benefit to the same extent as younger patients from the chemotherapy for colorectal cancer. Patients older than 75 years of age are usually excluded from metastatic colorectal cancer randomized studies. Some subset analyses with comparison of younger and elderly patients from these pooled data revealed the significance of the chemotherapy for elderly colorectal cancer patients. This article introduces the review of these subset analyses and JCOG1018 trial which is on-going study to clarify the efficacy of oxaliplatin combination first line chemotherapy for elderly metastatic colorectal cancer patients.