Melanoma: A Type of Skin Cancer
Surgical oncologist Lynn Dengel walks us through the risk factors and treatment plans for melanoma, a type of skin cancer.
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Transcript
Melanoma is a cancer of a cell in the skin called the melanocyte, and when that cell mutates and starts growing without regulation, it can become invasive and some types of melanoma can actually spread beyond the skin. There are classic risk factors for melanoma, such as fairer skin, blue eyes, sun exposure, and unfortunately it's sun exposure that we had as children that puts us at the highest risk for melanoma as an adult.
The melanoma UVA program is really outstanding. It's the medical oncologist, the pathologist, the surgeons, we all meet every week, we review every case of melanoma that presents to our offices.
The treatment for melanoma has changed dramatically in the recent decade. We now commonly use immunotherapy for advanced melanoma. Immunotherapy is different than chemotherapy. It is an IV medication, so it seems similar to patients I think because they're both given through an IV medication, it's not something you can take like a pill.
Immunotherapy is quite different the way that it works in your body, and really what it's doing is it's augmenting your own immune system to fight the melanoma.
From a surgical perspective, I do think it's really important to come to a multidisciplinary program for treatment of melanoma. It's not just the excellent surgical technique, but it's the evaluation of the results of that surgery in a multidisciplinary context that is really important in terms of deciding the appropriate treatment for each patient.
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