Primary dermal melanoma: a unique subtype of melanoma to be distinguished from cutaneous metastatic melanoma: a clinical, histologic, and gene expression-profiling study

Abstract

Background: Primary dermal melanoma (PDM) is a subtype of melanoma confined to the dermis that may be morphologically impossible to distinguish from cutaneous metastatic melanoma (CMM).

Objective: We sought to better characterize PDM by describing the clinical, histologic, and molecular features of 49 cases of PDM and determine whether a gene expression-profiling test could help distinguish PDM from CMM.

Methods: We describe 49 cases of PDM and determined whether any clinical or histopathologic features had a statistically significant relationship with outcome. Secondly, we performed a melanoma gene expression-profiling test on a subset of the PDM and CMM cases.

Results: Overall recurrence was infrequent and seen in 9 of 49 cases. Six patients had locoregional recurrences and 3 patients had distant metastasis. None of the clinical or histologic parameters showed a statistically significant relationship with recurrence. There was a statistically significant association of a class I signature by DecisionDx-Melanoma assay (Castle Biosciences Inc, Friendswood, TX) for PDM whereas CMM were more frequently class II (P value = .023).

Limitations: The mean follow-up time was 26 months.

Conclusions: Most conventional staging parameters used for prognosis in cutaneous melanoma have limited applicability to PDM. The melanoma prognostic assay may be a useful tool for distinguishing PDM from CMM.

Keywords: American Joint Committee on Cancer; cutaneous metastatic melanoma; fluorescence in situ hybridization; gene expression profile; melanoma; primary dermal melanoma.