Objective To compare the clinical effect between neo-adjuvant chemotherapy combined with operation and simple operation under multi-disciplinary team in rectal cancer. Methods A survey of 72 patients with rectal cancer from Nov. 2007 to Mar. 2008 were studied. Patients were divided into two groups using a simple random method: 33 cases in combined therapy group were treated with single period neo-adjuvant chemotherapy as well as operation and 39 cases in control group received operation only. To compare the differences of perioperative period indexes between two groups. Results During the differences of indexes of age, gender, differentiation degree, clinicopathologic stage as well as the distance to dentate line of tumor, there was no statistical significance between combined therapy group and control group (Pgt;0.05). And at the same time, the operative type, operative time and bleeding quantity in operation had no statistically significant difference between two groups (Pgt;0.05). As for the postoperative rehabilitation indexes, the time of vent to normal in combined therapy group was earlier than that in control group, but the intake time was later than that in control group （Plt;0.05）. Falling range from preoperative CEA to postoperative CEA was larger in combined therapy group than that in control group （Plt;0.05）; and the falling range from preoperative WBC to postoperative WBC had no significant difference between two groups （Pgt;0.05）. Conclusion The clinical effect of combined therapy is obviously superior to simple operation, suggesting that neo-adjuvant chemotherapy combined with operation is feasible and safe.