New treatment stabilizes melanoma

The Mayo Clinic says a new treatment may offer hope for patients with metastatic melanoma

A study published in this month's issue of Cancer shows the combination of paclitaxel and carboplatin appears to be effective for metastatic melanoma when traditional treatments have failed.

"Melanoma is unfortunately one of the few cancers that has become more common over the last few decades, and when it becomes metastatic, there are very few treatment options," said oncologist Ravi Rao, lead investigator of the study. "This is a good step towards better treating this cancer.

Nearly half of the patients that received the drug combination experienced disease stabilization or tumor size reduction, the study said.

The National Cancer Institute reports a 2.4 percent increase in the incidence of melanoma between 1992 and 2002. New cases are diagnosed in about 60,000 people each year in the United States, and almost 8,000 die because of metastasized melanoma.

© Copyright 2006 by United Press International