Moffitt Study Finds New Immunotherapy Strategy for Enhancing Melanoma Treatment
Source: doc wire news, March 2025
Recent advancements in the melanoma treatment paradigm have drastically improved outcomes and changed the diagnosis of metastatic melanoma from a horrible prognosis to a potentially curable one. DocWire News spoke to John Fruehauf, MD, field medical director at Evolent, about how new therapies have improved the landscape of metastatic melanoma care.
DocWire News: How has the prognosis for metastatic melanoma changed over the years? Is this disease now potentially curable?
Dr. John Fruehauf: Yes, I think that the biggest improvement in survival in cancer through new treatments is melanoma. Melanoma is the one disease that we have had a huge breakthrough in survival. If I had seen a patient 15 years ago in my clinic, they’d have stage four melanoma. I would be telling them we don’t have any therapy, that we have a statistically significant improvement in survival that we can give you, but we can give you treatment to help your symptoms and make you more comfortable. However, for stage four melanoma, the average survival was from 10 to 12 months. It was a dismal scenario, but there were glimmers of possibility for advance based on Steve Rosenberg’s work at the National Cancer Institute. He was chief of the surgery branch while I was there doing my fellowship. And in fact, he’s only recently retired, but he is still very active and involved in immunotherapy for melanoma.