Treatment of the skin cancer melanoma continues to improve, Elizabeth Tracey reports

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The skin cancer melanoma has historically been associated with difficulties in treatment and survival, but that picture is changing rapidly. Now the results of a ten year trial support use of two agents to manage this disease, according to Kimmel Cancer Center director William Nelson at Johns Hopkins.

Nelson: Two different immune checkpoint inhibitors, one called ipilimumab and a drug nivolumab. They did a clinical trial where they did the combination of the two versus each one individually. It was clear that the combination of the two and nivolumab outperformed ipilumamab alone. Overall survival at 10 years 43% with ipilimumab and nivolumab versus 37% with nivolumab alone and only 19% with ipilimumab alone.   :32

Nelson notes that several other drugs to treat the disease are also in various stages of study, rendering melanoma much more manageable than ever. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.