Two-Stage Turnbull-Cutait Pull-Through Coloanal Anastomosis for Low Rectal Cancers

To the Editor We congratulate Biondo et al¹ for what is, to our knowledge, the first randomized clinical trial (RCT) comparing classic coloanal anastomosis (CAA) with ileostomy with the 2-stage Turnbull-Cutait pull-through coloanal anastomosis (CTA) after ultralow rectal resection. Authors showed that CTA had nonsignificant lower complications rates (37.8% vs 45.7%; P = .40), lower anastomotic leakage (AL) rate (13% vs 23.9%; P = .20), and similar functional results at 1 year.¹ However, there are 3 specific considerations in comparing the 2 techniques that we would like to highlight.