Introduction: From a surgeon's point of view surgical therapy of rectal carcinoma: Value of imaging

Surgical therapy of rectal carcinoma has advanced enormously since the 1990s. However, not only the surgical technique itself has improved; first and foremost has been the effort to adapt the radicality of the surgical approach to the individual patient. The objective is to avoid therapies that are either too aggressive or too conservative, while taking the patient's unique situation into account. A surgery that is too radical may not further increase the chance of cure, but may ultimately result in a long-lasting and severe reduction in quality of life. If the therapy regimen is too conservative, an increased rate of recurrence will result and the patient's long-term survival will be unavoidably reduced. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2010.