Melanoma Highlights From Chicago 2011

www.medscape.org/viewarticle/748571?src=cme_mp_top

In 2011, approximately 70,230 Americans (40,010 males and 30,220 females) will be diagnosed with melanoma, and an additional 53,360 will be diagnosed with melanoma in situ (noninvasive cancer). Although melanoma accounts for less than 5% of all skin cancer cases, it is responsible for most deaths that occur from skin cancer; an estimated 8790 people (5750 male and 3040 female) will die of melanoma in the United States in 2011. ^[1] 

US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved therapies for advanced melanoma include the chemotherapy agent dacarbazine, its oral equivalent temozolomide, and high-dose interleukin-2 (IL-2). Ipilimumab, an anti-CTLA-4 receptor antibody, was the first agent to show a survival advantage in a phase 3 randomized trial for advanced melanoma, and it recently gained FDA approval for treatment of unresectable or metastatic melanoma. Vemurafenib tablets for the treatment of unresectable or metastatic melanoma in patients with the BRAF^V600E mutation was approved recently, as was a companion diagnostic test for the mutation. Several novel targeted therapies, including BRAF inhibitors, are currently in late-stage clinical development. Jeffrey S. Weber, MD, PhD, Director of the Donald A. Adam Comprehensive Melanoma Research Center at the Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, Florida, highlights some of the latest findings in melanoma as presented at the 2011 American Society of Clinical Oncology ® annual meeting.