For decades, surgery has been used as the gold standard for the treatment of cancer, especially solid tumors. The position in people’s mind has become unshakable. Once diagnosed with a tumor, the first thing that patients and their families think about is whether they can have surgery to remove it, thinking that surgery will make them better. As oncology has developed to today, this understanding is already wrong and has become a misleading one. Many patients have got counterproductive results as a result. The reason for this is that patients cannot be blamed for their lack of awareness, but it is the responsibility of oncologists who have not popularized the latest view of oncology treatment to the public in time. Currently, surgery is still the primary choice of cancer treatment. However, not all cancer patients need surgery or choose surgery first. If not chosen properly, surgery can also accelerate the deterioration of the disease. Not all tumors are removed and everything is fine. There is a principle that surgery is the first choice for cancer treatment, and that is to achieve a radical cure. If radical cure cannot be achieved, other treatment methods such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy should be combined. Chemotherapy and radiotherapy can not only turn many cancers that cannot be completely removed into those that can be removed, but also further consolidate and improve the results of surgical treatment. Some head and neck tumors, such as laryngeal cancer, are already in the middle and late stage when discovered, or cannot be removed due to metastasis. At this time, if a certain dose of radiotherapy is given first, the tumor shrinks and can be operated again. This can also improve the treatment effect of the tumor. The same applies to some digestive tumors, which cannot be removed surgically because of the invasion of important organs, such as large blood vessels, when they are found. If several courses of chemotherapy are used first, the tumor will be separated from the large blood vessels and can be completely removed. Many tumors can be cured with a certain amount of chemotherapy or radiotherapy after surgery. Local radiotherapy can reduce local tumor recurrence. Systemic chemotherapy can reduce the chance of distant metastasis and prolong the life of patients. These advances in tumor treatment provide opportunities that can make tumor patients live longer and better, changing the previous treatment model of surgery alone and advocating a multidisciplinary and integrated treatment model including surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy. To sum up, when one has cancer, whether to choose surgery and when to choose surgery should be based on the specific condition and reasonable arrangement of treatment order in order to maximize the effect of various tumor treatment tools and thus achieve the best treatment effect. Therefore, cancer removal, the timing should be properly chosen.