Immunotherapy for Metastatic Melanoma – In the Clinic

Source: Cancer Therapy Advisor, March 2018

Staging melanoma requires consideration of multiple factors: thickness, ulceration status, the number of involved lymph nodes, and the presence of metastases.1
Patients with stage II or worse disease are more likely to develop metastases in their lifetime. While the primary treatment for melanoma is surgical excision, patients with metastatic disease require additional therapy; immunotherapy is an innovative class of medications accumulating data for use in this patient-group.
In melanoma, the immune response plays a crucial role via CTLA-4 and PD-1. CTLA-4 is a regulator of the body’s activated immune system response to cancer cells and down-regulates T cell activation.2 Ipilimumab is an anti-CTLA-4 monoclonal antibody designed to stimulate the immune system’s response to melanoma by bolstering T cell activation.