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Review
. 2009 Jun;23(3):583-97, x.
doi: 10.1016/j.hoc.2009.03.006.

The history and future of chemotherapy for melanoma

Arvin S Yang  1 , Paul B Chapman
Affiliations
Review

The history and future of chemotherapy for melanoma

Arvin S Yang et al. Hematol Oncol Clin North Am. 2009 Jun.

Abstract

Melanoma is considered a chemotherapy-resistant cancer, but in reality there are several chemotherapy drugs with significant single-agent activity. Response rates to combination regimens are reproducibly higher than with standard dacarbazine, but of the randomized trials comparing combination regimens with dacarbazine, none were of sufficient size to detect a realistic effect on survival. Similarly, adjuvant chemotherapy has not had a realistic test in melanoma. Response to chemotherapy is associated reproducibly with better survival rates suggesting that regimens with higher response rates are needed. Recent observations suggest that combining antiangiogenic agents with either dacarbazine or temozolomide can double response rates. These combinations are worthy of further investigation and might serve as a foundation on which to build a combination regimen that improves overall survival in metastatic melanoma patients.

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Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Response rates of trials using myeloablative chemotherapy followed by autologous bone marrow rescue.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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