Optimizing systemic therapy selection in metastatic colorectal cancer

For metastatic colorectal cancer, many effective agents can be incorporated into multiple lines of therapy across the nearly 3-year continuum of treatment. Emphasis should be on using all the recommended agents, with extended duration of anti-vascular endothelial growth factor treatment, and on identifying patients with any mutation in the RAS pathway. Chemotherapy plus bevacizumab or an epidermal growth factor receptor antibody are both viable options as first-line therapy in patients with RAS wild-type disease.