
Title: Pathology: Patient: Melanoma Description: This slide shows a melanoma on a patient’s skin. Subjects (names): Topics/Categories: Pathology — Patient Type: Black & White Print. Color Slide Source: National Cancer Institute Author: Unknown photographer/artist AV Number: AV-8500-3850 Date Created: 1985 Date Entered: 1/1/2001 Access: Public (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
At first, Krista Easom figured the little red bump on her foot was nothing more than a blister.
It didn’t hurt, but after a couple months, it didn’t go away either.
She booked an appointment with a dermatologist to have it removed. She wasn’t worried. Easom, a 24-year-old law school student from New Jersey, was healthy, had no family history of cancer and was getting ready to enjoy some time in her newly adopted city of Chicago.
That’s when she received the results from her dermatologist, who removed a part of the blister and had it tested.
It turns out that little red bump was malignant melanoma, the leading cause of skin cancer death in the United States. It’s a cancer that kills one person every hour, which translates to more than 8,700 Americans each year.
Further tests revealed that Easom’s melanoma had spread to her lymph nodes, which meant she needed a lymphadenectomy to have them removed. This major surgery includes a five-day stay in the hospital followed by an extensive recovery. About half of the patients who undergo this procedure suffer from wound infections because of the 12-inch incision’s hip-to-thigh location.
Easom and her family looked into her options and she was referred to Northwestern Medicine® surgical oncologists Jeffery D. Wayne, MD and Karl Bilimoria, MD, two of the very few surgeons in the country using a minimally invasive procedure to remove groin lymph nodes. This laparoscopic procedure may drastically reduce the recovery rate and chance of infection for patients like Easom.
“Only a handful of surgeons in the country are doing this and it makes a world of difference to the patient,” said Bilimoria, a surgical oncologist at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and an assistant professor of surgery at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “Instead of a 12-inch scar, this laparoscopic procedure has only three very small incisions that total less than one inch. Because these incisions are so small, the chance of infection is far less. Instead of a five-day stay in the hospital, Krista went home the day after her surgery.”
Lymph nodes are the most frequent site of the spread of metastatic melanoma and surgically removing them is the only potential for a cure, Wayne said.
“Surgery is the only way to make sure we get all of the cancer,” Wayne said. “We want Krista to move on with her life. The minimally-invasive procedure was by far, the quickest and safest way for her to do that.”
Just a few weeks post-surgery, Easom is already on her way. She will have regular check-ups for awhile but her CT scans and blood tests show that the surgery successfully removed all of her cancer. Easom is participating in a national clinical trial to see if this minimally invasive procedure can help other melanoma patients.
The Latest Bing News on:
Melanoma
- Global Intraocular Melanoma Treatment Market is expected to grow steadily grow at CAGR of 7.9% in the Forecast Period of 2021-2026on February 27, 2021 at 7:47 am
For a snapshot of the primary and secondary data of the market (2015-2025), along with business strategies and detailed market segmentation, please click on the request sample report. The sample ...
- Top 10 Risk Factors Of Melanoma And How To Prevent Iton February 27, 2021 at 6:03 am
In partnership with The Fresh Toast Researchers are committed to gaining more information about melanoma, its potential causes, and ways people can protect themselves against this type of cancer. Do ...
- Solo Exhibit By Artist Melanie Brannan To Raise Funds For AIM At Melanoma Foundationon February 26, 2021 at 7:09 pm
How do we honor the meaning of friendship and the potential loss of that relationship? Dallas artist Melanie M. Brannan struggles with this question while presenting a vulnerable yet joyful series of ...
- Network models of primary melanoma microenvironments identify key melanoma regulators underlying prognosison February 22, 2021 at 3:07 am
While the molecular profiling of melanoma progression has been extensively characterised by large-scale studies, there is still need for the comprehensive integration of such datasets. Here the ...
- Dr. Roach: No universally accepted level for post-melanoma monitoringon February 21, 2021 at 9:02 pm
My husband developed melanoma, and had 16 of his lymph nodes removed. He was considered a cancer survivor, as one of the nodes was cancerous. He went for skin check-ups twice a year and was give ...
- Immunocore’s tebentafusp granted Breakthrough Therapy Designation for unresectable or metastatic uveal melanoma from FDAon February 19, 2021 at 4:00 am
Immunocore, a late-stage biotechnology company pioneering the development of a novel class of T cell receptor bispecific immunotherapies designed to treat a broad range of diseases, including cancer, ...
- AI uses "ugly duckling" technique to spot melanoma with high accuracyon February 18, 2021 at 5:22 pm
Artificial intelligence is starting to combine with smartphone technology in ways that could have profound impacts on the way we monitor health, from tracking blood volume changes in diabetics to ...
- Changes to gut microbiome help melanoma patients respond to immunotherapyon February 17, 2021 at 2:16 pm
Statistical modeling developed by Oregon State University researchers has confirmed that changes to melanoma patients' gut microbiome led them to respond to a type of treatment capable of providing ...
- New test to help fight deadly melanomaon February 15, 2021 at 7:51 am
Researchers from QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute have developed a prototype test that can help identify if patients with deadly metastasised melanoma are likely to benefit from immunotherapy ...
- This ‘AI doctor’ can assess skin melanoma as accurately as human dermatologistson February 15, 2021 at 5:58 am
Scientists from the University of Gothenburg have developed an algorithm that identifies the severity of skin melanoma as accurately as dermatologists.
The Latest Google Headlines on:
Melanoma
The Latest Bing News on:
Melanoma treatment
- State-of-the-art Skin Cancer Treatment In Bayon February 27, 2021 at 5:38 pm
The launch of a new dermatology practice offering the ‘gold standard’ in skin cancer treatment was celebrated with nibbles and mocktails on Wednesday [February 24]. Specialist dermatologist and ...
- Top 10 Risk Factors Of Melanoma And How To Prevent Iton February 27, 2021 at 6:03 am
In partnership with The Fresh Toast Researchers are committed to gaining more information about melanoma, its potential causes, and ways people can protect themselves against this type of cancer. Do ...
- Global Intraocular Melanoma Treatment Market is expected to grow steadily grow at CAGR of 7.9% in the Forecast Period of 2021-2026on February 27, 2021 at 3:56 am
The new report by Expert Market Research titled, ‘Global Intraocular Melanoma Treatment Market Report and Forecast 2021-2026’, gives an in-depth analysis of the global intraocular ...
- Increase in eye cancer cases will boost the uveal melanoma treatment market, forecast to grow at a CAGR of 13%on February 24, 2021 at 9:01 pm
Report Ocean Pvt Ltd –:Global Uveal melanoma treatment Market is estimated to see healthy growth, pegged at a CAGR of ~13% during the forecast period 2020-2025. The global market for uveal melanoma ...
- New skin cancer treatment: Mohs surgery available at Pindara Private Hospital on Gold Coaston February 23, 2021 at 1:30 pm
A LESS invasive skin cancer treatment for delicate and difficult areas is now available on the Gold Coast, but only at Pindara Private Hospital.
- Israeli-made treatment for non-melenoma skin cancer in developmenton February 23, 2021 at 12:47 pm
Preclinical in-vitrio research done by MediWound as well as existing research have found that bromelain has anti-cancer properties.
- MediWound Launches Clinical Development Program for Treatment of Non-Melanoma Skin Canceron February 22, 2021 at 3:32 am
MediWound Ltd. (Nasdaq: MDWD), a fully integrated biopharmaceutical company focused on next-generation bio-therapeutic solutions for tissue repair and regeneration, today announced the initiation of a ...
- NOX5: a novel target for sensitising melanoma to therapieson February 19, 2021 at 9:59 am
Vito Quaranta discusses how cancers adopting novel mechanisms of energy production could be sensitised to therapies with a focus on melanoma.
- Changes to gut microbiome help melanoma patients respond to immunotherapyon February 17, 2021 at 2:16 pm
Statistical modeling developed by Oregon State University researchers has confirmed that changes to melanoma patients' gut microbiome led them to respond to a type of treatment capable of providing ...
- Injectable hydrogels of newly designed brush biopolymers as sustained drug-delivery vehicle for melanoma treatmenton February 15, 2021 at 2:53 am
Novel biocompatible and brush copolymers have been developed for cancer treatment using its controlled drug-release potential. Polyurethane graft on linear dextrin has been synthesized to control the ...