Posts Tagged ‘Melanoma’

Melanoma – a type of skin cancer. What are causes, symptoms, risk factors and treatment?

Melanoma is a kind of skin cancer. Melanocytes are the cells present in skin. This type of cancer occurs when melanocytes starts growing rapidly and uncontrolled. Usually, its a skin disease but sometimes it may also occur in the bowel and eye. This skin cancer can appear on skin or begin as a mole.
Melanomas do not occur only in the areas that are exposed to sun, major area is skin. The most common site in men is the back and the most common site in women is the leg.

CAUSES AND RISK FACTORS OF MELANOMA

- Ultraviolet radiation.
- Ordinary moles that can become cancerous.
- Too many moles increases the risk of melanoma.
- Fair complexion increases the risk of melanoma.
- Family and personal history of melanoma.
- People who have weak immune system.
- People who have bad sunburn.
- Exposure to some harmful chemicals.

SYMPTOMS OF MELANOMA

- There is a change of color, shape, size of the mole.
- The shape of half is different from other half.
- The edges become rough.
- The edges become irregular.
- The color becomes very uneven.
- The size also changes.

TYPES OF MELANOMA

According to the appearance, melanoma is divided into different types:
- Superficial spreading melanoma (SSM)
- Melanoma caused by sun damaged skin of face, scalp and neck.
- Melanoma caused on soles of feet, palms of hands or under the nails.

Diagnosis is done by the doctor by doing a biopsy. After the diagnosis, staging is done which tells how thick is the tumor and how deeply it has affected the skin.

TREATMENT FOR MELANOMA

- The standard treatment for melanoma is surgery.
- Tumor along with the tissues surrounding it are removed so that the chances of tumor spreading is decreased.
- The thickness of the melanoma decides the extent of surgery.
- The doctor can also do radiation therapy, chemotherapy and medications or a combination of different methods.

Complication of melanoma may include damage to tissues, fatigue, nausea, weakness, pain and spread to other organs.

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Melanoma – Type of skin cancer

Melanoma is a disease of the skin in which cancer cells are found in the melanocytes, the cells that produce color in the skin or pigment known as melanin. Melanoma usually occurs in adults, but it may occasionally be found in children and adolescents. Melanoma may also be called cutaneous melanoma or malignant melanoma. Melanoma is the rarest, but most virulent, form of skin cancer.

- A flat or raised growth of black or brown color, often mixed with blue, red, or white parts, from 6 mm to few cm in size, may appear anywhere on the skin, in men mostly on the trunk, in women on the back and legs, and parts of the skin that are usually hidden from the sun, but were exposed to intense sunlight for short periods.
- Melanoma may show one or more of typical ABCDE characteristics: Asymmetry: one part of the tumor differs from other parts; Border of the tumor is irregular; Color: tumor may be of different colors, often several colors are present in one tumor; Diameter above 6 mm (in most cases), Evolving: lesion growths and changes color and appearance with time.

Melanoma Subtypes :
- Superficially spreading melanoma grows relatively slowly.
- Nodular melanoma grows rapidly – weeks to months. It tends to ulcerate and bleed.
- Acral lentiginous melanoma appears in dark skinned people (Afro-American, Asian, and Hispanic), mostly on their palms, soles, and under nails.
- Lentigo maligna melanoma. A macule grows slowly (years) as a patch, over 1-3 cm in size. It does not spread to other organs.

Treatment :
- Chemotherapy is often used to treat melanoma that has returned or spread.
- Medications such as interferon or interleukin, which boost the immune system to fight the cancer, may be useful in addition to chemotherapy and surgery. This kind of treatment is called immunotherapy. However, interferon has many side effects and can be difficult to tolerate.
- Radiation treatments may be used to relieve pain or discomfort caused by cancer that has spread.
- Cancer that has spread elsewhere in the body is sometimes removed with surgery to relieve pain or discomfort.