Ryan EJ, et al. - Given that in locally advanced rectal cancer, total mesorectal excision (TME) is conventionally performed approximately 6–8 weeks after neoadjuvant long-course chemoradiotherapy (nCRT), researchers examined the outcomes following an extension of this interval. They performed a systematic search identifying 26 relevant publications, including four RCTs, with 25,445 patients. The analysis revealed an increase in pathological complete response and downstaging rates and improvement in recurrence-free survival in correlation with a minimum 8-week interval from the end of nCRT to TME. This was evident without compromising surgical morbidity.