Anti-angiogenic therapy for gastrointestinal tumours

New therapeutic strategies that notably lack cross resistance with established treatment regimens are much needed in gastroenterological oncology. One such approach is therapeutic anti-angiogenesis which aims at the inhibition of vasculature growth in solid tumours. Since numerous gastrointestinal tumours show strong tumour neoangiogenesis and consequently are highly vascularised, anti-angiogenic therapies will play a pivotal role in tomorrow's gastroenterological oncology. Hence, this review covers (i) basic mechanisms of tumour angiogenesis, (ii) recent anti-angiogenic strategies in the field of gastroenterological oncology as well as (iii) a discussion of their current limitations and perspectives.