Melanoma & Skin Cancer

Omid Hamid, MD, Chief, Translational Research and Immunotherapy, Director, Melanoma Therapeutics, The Angeles Clinic, discusses a recent trial investigating the combination of vemurafenib and atezolizumab in melanoma in patients with previously untreated BRAF-positive unresectable or metastatic melanoma.

Ashani Weeraratna, PhD, associate professor, Tumor Microenvironment and Metastasis Program, member, The Wistar Institute Melanoma Research Center, discusses a study examining the effects of aging on Wnt/ß-catenin signaling in melanoma.

James Allison, chair of Immunology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses promising data regarding the use of immunotherapies in melanoma. Allison is particularly excited about a trial, presented at the Society of Melanoma Research Congress, which looked at the combination of PD-L1 inhibitors with a BRAF-targeted agent.

Tara C. Mitchell, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, discuses preliminary results from a phase I/11 study of epacadostat in combination with pembrolizumab.

James Allison, PhD, discusses the rapidly expanding field of immunotherapy in melanoma.

The FDA has requested additional data for the use of single-agent nivolumab in previously untreated patients with BRAF V600 mutation-positive advanced melanoma.

Dirk Schadendorf, MD, Head of Department for Dermatology, Venerology und Allergology, University Hospital Essen, Germany, discusses the results from the phase III CheckMate 067 study, which looked at a combination immunotherapy regimen in advanced melanoma.

Robert Andtbacka, MD, discusses how the role of oncolytic immunotherapies continues to evolve in melanoma and gives a better understanding of what is on the horizon for the novel therapeutics.

The European Commission has approved the combination of vemurafenib (Zelboraf) and cobimetinib (Cotellic) as a treatment for patients with BRAF-positive metastatic or unresectable melanoma.

Jeffrey S. Weber, MD, PhD, deputy director, Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Cancer Center, co-director of its Melanoma Program, head of Experimental Therapeutics, NYU Langone Medical Center, compares the efficacy of dabrafenib plus trametinib versus vemurafenib plus cobimetinib.

The FDA has expanded the approval for single-agent nivolumab (Opdivo) to include the frontline treatment of patients with BRAF wild-type advanced melanoma.

Treatment with the combination of vemurafenib and cobimetinib improved overall survival by 4.9 months compared with vemurafenib alone for patients with BRAF mutation-positive advanced melanoma.

A treatment regimen of pembrolizumab plus low-dose ipilimumab was tolerable and effective for patients with advanced melanoma.

In the largest-to-date analysis of treatment-naïve metastatic melanoma patients with BRAF V600 mutations treated with dabrafenib and trametinib, researchers have found that baseline LDH levels and number of disease sites were the most significant factors affecting survival.

Two separate early phase clinical trials exploring pembrolizumab-containing immunotherapy combinations have shown objective response rates over 50% in patients with advanced melanoma.

Making real strides in melanoma care requires an understanding of BRAF resistance mechanisms.

Georgina Long, BSc, PhD, MBBS, FRACP, medical oncologist, translational researcher, Melanoma Institute Australia, The University of Sydney, discusses which patients may benefit from the combination of dabrafenib and trametinib based on several recent clinical trials.

Victoria Atkinson, MD, of Princess Alexandra Hospital and Gallipoli Medical Research Foundation, Queensland, discusses long-term data from the phase III CheckMate-066 trial.

Since the approval of the first checkpoint inhibitor, ipilimumab, several combinations and monotherapies have gained rapid approval, with continued expansion on the horizon.

The FDA has granted a full approval to the combination of dabrafenib and trametinib for patients with unresectable or metastatic BRAF-mutated melanoma.

Jason Luke, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine, the University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center, discusses how inflammation in the tumor microenvironment can serve as a biomarker in melanoma.

Long-term data continue to show sustained improvements in overall survival with nivolumab alone or in combination with ipilimumab as a frontline treatment for patients with advanced melanoma.