Treatment for Melanoma That has Spread to Lymph Nodes

Melanoma is a deadly type of skin cancer. Treatment is much more effective if the cancer is caught early and removed with surgery. Melanoma that has spread to the lymph nodes is much more difficult to treat. Melanoma that has spread to distant lymph nodes has a poor prognosis. According to the University of Florida Shands Cancer Center, only five to ten percent of patients diagnosed with melanoma that has spread beyond the local lymph nodes survive past five years.

Surgery

• Surgery is commonly used to treat melanoma and melanoma that has spread to the lymph nodes. The primary cancer tumor is removed along with adjacent skin and regional lymph nodes. Because there is such a high risk that some cancer cells are left behind after surgery, additional treatments like radiation or chemotherapy are usually given too. Removal of lymph nodes may leave the patient with numbness and swelling, or lymphedema.

Immunotherapy

• Immunotherapy holds the most promise for treating melanoma of the lymph nodes of all therapies in use today. This is thought to be true because of the few cases of spontaneous remission on record. Shands Cancer Center says doctors believe the remissions occurred because of an immune response that rejected the cancer which might be duplicated with immunotherapy. Interferon and interleukin are two immunotherapy drugs being used today. Both of these have significant side effects which include low blood pressure, shortness of breath, infections and cardiac abnormalities.

Radiation

• Radiation is not effective for all types of melanoma. It works best in patients that have smaller tumors. Internal radiation, which involves implanting radioactive seeds inside the body, is used to treat melanoma of the eye. Gamma knife therapy, which uses a precisely focused gamma ray, is used to treat the cancer when it has spread to the brain.

Chemotherapy

• Chemotherapy is used to treat melanoma that has spread to the lymph nodes. It is sometimes used in combination with immunotherapy or radiation therapy. According to the University of Maryland Medical Center, no current chemotherapy drugs can cure melanoma. Chemotherapy is used to slow the progression of melanoma and prolong life.

Palliative Therapy

• Palliative care is given to patients with melanoma that has spread throughout the body and cannot be cured. The goal of this therapy is to relieve pain and discomfort as best as possible and improve the quality of life. This might require radiation therapy, chemotherapy or surgery to remove or shrink pain causing tumors.