[Peculiarities of diagnosis and treatment of initial forms of rectal cancer].

Of 3185 patients, the stage I rectal cancer was diagnosed in 220 (6.9%), stage II--in 156 (4.9%), stage III--in 1948 (61.2%), stage IV--in 861 (27.0%). The causes of late diagnosis were the following: asymptomatic course of the disease (74.2%), delayed taking the medical advice, incomplete (without rectal inspection) examination of the patients. The sphincter-preserving operations were performed in 86.3% of the patients. The 5-year survival of patients in stage I was (97.6 +/- 2.5)%, in stage II--(75.7 +/- 4.1)%.