Intralesional interferon-alpha therapy in advanced malignant melanoma

Abstract

Fifty-one evaluable patients with histologically proven metastatic melanoma and at least one skin metastasis were treated intralesionally with interferon-alpha (IFN-alpha). Twenty-six of the patients were given highly purified natural IFN-alpha 6 Mio. IU three times per week. Twenty-five patients were given 10 Mio. IU three times per week of a recombinant IFN-alpha 2b (rIFN-alpha 2b). All patients were examined for systemic and local responses to this treatment. The systemic responses consisted of nine objective remissions, each of which lasted from 2 to 18 or more months. There were 24 complete or partial local responses. Forty-two of the 51 patients had at least two skin metastases so that IFN-injected and noninjected tumor sites could be compared. The difference between systemic and local efficacy was highly significant statistically (P = 0.0004). The results show that IFN-alpha has clinically observable antitumor activity in malignant melanoma.

Amelanotic lentigo maligna managed with topical imiquimod as immunotherapy

“…41 It has been shown to stimulate anti-melanoma cytotoxic T lymphocytes in melanoma cell cultures. 42 Systemic IFN-␣ has been shown to improve disease-free and overall survival in advanced melanoma, 43 and intralesional IFN-␣ as therapy has been reported in melanoma 44 and in both LM and recurrent LM. 45 The successful use of topical imiquimod in the treatment of cutaneous neoplasia is presumably brought about by its ability to act as a potent apoptosis inducer and immune response-modifying agent through the induction of IFN-␣ and other cytokines.…”

Armed antibodies for cancer treatment: a promising tool in a changing era

“…Clinical responses during IIT in melanoma metastases with several agents have been reported since 1960 in up to 90 % of injected lesions [40]. Immunostimulatory agents that have been used for intralesional treatment of injectable metastases include cytokines such as granulocyte-macrophage colonystimulating factor [33], interferon-α [34] and interferon-β [35] and IL2 [36][37][38][39][40], this last agent being the one that showed the most promising signs of activity.…”

Current state of treatment for primary cutaneous melanoma

“…Local injection of multiple agents such of fotemusine [104], bleomycin [105], cisplatin [106], IL-2 [107], and IFN-α [108], has been investigated as a method of controlling cutaneous and subcutaneous metastatic melanoma. Another commonly used intralesional therapy GM-CSF, which can result in significant regression of melanoma deposits [109,110].…”