Treatment of Melanoma Stage IV

Treatment of Melanoma Stage IV

Introduction

There are numerous benefits attributed to the use of two drugs ipilimumab and vemurafenib, thus Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had approved its use about two years ago. However it must be taken into consideration that the cost related to the treatment needs to be taken under control.

As per a research under Chapman et al., 2011, treatment of 337 patients was done through the use of vemurafenib out of a total sample of 675 patients who had not been treated before. The median age for the patients was 56, and it consisted of 200 males, which makes up of 59% of the entire sample. Furthermore, 333 patients (99%) were white. It included participants from every corner of the world namely Australia, North America, Western Europe, and some other part with a proportion of 39, 86, 205, and 7 respectively. It showed that the survival rates were enhanced to a level of 84%, consequently mitigating the risk of death by 63%.

Sosman et al, 2012 also conducted a study about the effectiveness of vemurafenib. 132 patients were taken as sample for this study, of which male consisted of 81(61%) and female were 51(39%). 98% of the participants were white amounting to 130 and the majority (81%) was below the age of 65 and the other 19% being above 65. The average survival in terms of months had become about 16 months.

Treatment of Melanoma Stage IV

Melanoma stage IV is treated with two drugs ipilimumab (immunotherapy) and vemurafenib (MAP kinase pathway inhibitor). These drugs are verified by FDA in 2011. None of them is effective as a single agent and are used in combination. Interleukin-2, decarbazine, multikinase inhibitors, KIT and MEK inhibitors are the other options for the treatment of stage IV melanoma ...