Skin Cancer Blog

This month’s research article is from QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Brisbane, Australia. The authors consider the important question: what is the risk of melanoma recurrences among patients with a high-risk, localised melanoma?

Thirteen per cent of patients with these high-risk tumours experience a recurrence within two years. Most (70 per cent) were locoregional, and most of those (about 60 per cent) remained disease free for another two years after locoregional surgery.

Head and neck location, SNLB positivity and other markers of aggressive tumour type were associated with risk of recurrence.

Implications for primary care doctors is that regular, routine follow-up of patients who have had melanoma excised is important, as it may facilitate early diagnosis of recurrence (most of which is locoregional) and that may improve the chances of disease-free survival.

Read the paper here.

Do you follow up your patients with melanoma, and do you insist on regular (say, six monthly) review?

Professor David Wilkinson

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Read more from Professor David Wilkinson on recent research:

• Dysplastic naevi genetic makeup
• What to do when a partial biopsy of a suspected melanoma is performed
• Artificial Intelligence in clinical practice
• Prof David Wilkinson on melanoma guidelines: Dermoscopy
• How will artificial intelligence benefit GPs in skin cancer medicine?

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Learn more about skin cancer medicine in primary care at the next Skin Cancer Certificate Courses: