The use of gemcitabine and oxaliplatin is well documented in selected patients with advanced biliary tract carcinoma (BTC), but little is known on the feasibility of systemic treatments in patients with a performance status (PS) of 2. We retrospectively examined the medical records of consecutive BTC patients with a PS of 2 receiving gemcitabine 1000 mg/m(2) plus oxaliplatin 100 mg/m(2) every 2 weeks from January 2003 to December 2011 in our institution. Body composition was analysed by computed tomography scan to detect sarcopenia. The primary evaluation criterion was safety. The secondary evaluation criteria were the response rate, progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Twenty-eight patients (median age: 63 years, range 41-83) received a total of 175 cycles (median per patient: 6, range 2-12). Ten patients (35.7%) had sarcopenia on the pretreatment computed tomography scan. The most frequent toxicities were thrombocytopenia (grades 2-4: n=4, 14.3%), peripheral neuropathy (grades 2-3: n=9, 32.1%) and cholangitis (n=4, 14.3%). The best response was a partial response in 10.7% of patients [95% confidence interval (CI): 0-22.2] and stable disease in 42.9% of patients. The median PFS and OS were 4.6 (95% CI: 2.5-6.3) and 7.5 (95% CI: 5.2-9.5) months, respectively. The median PFS and OS were significantly longer in patients without sarcopenia: 7.0 months (95% CI: 4.4-8.0) vs. 2.2 months (95% CI: 2.0-2.5), P less than 0.01, and 10.4 months (95% CI: 7.5-11.6) vs. 4.9 months (95% CI: 3.7-5.2), P less than 0.01, respectively. In our experience, gemcitabine-oxaliplatin was feasible and induced effective palliation in PS2 patients with advanced BTC. Further studies are warranted to confirm these findings.