Recent Successes and Future Directions in Immunotherapy of Cutaneous Melanoma

Abstract

The global health burden associated with melanoma continues to increase while treatment options for metastatic melanoma are limited. Nevertheless, in the past decade, the field of cancer immunotherapy has witnessed remarkable advances for the treatment of a number of malignancies including metastatic melanoma. Although the earliest observations of an immunological antitumor response were made nearly a century ago, it was only in the past 30 years, that immunotherapy emerged as a viable therapeutic option, in particular for cutaneous melanoma. As such, melanoma remains the focus of various preclinical and clinical studies to understand the immunobiology of cancer and to test various tumor immunotherapies. Here, we review key recent developments in the field of immune-mediated therapy of melanoma. Our primary focus is on therapies that have received regulatory approval. Thus, a brief overview of the pathophysiology of melanoma is provided. The purported functions of various tumor-infiltrating immune cell subsets are described, in particular the recently described roles of intratumoral dendritic cells. The section on immunotherapies focuses on strategies that have proved to be the most clinically successful such as immune checkpoint blockade. Prospects for novel therapeutics and the potential for combinatorial approaches are delineated. Finally, we briefly discuss nanotechnology-based platforms which can in theory, activate multiple arms of immune system to fight cancer. The promising advances in the field of immunotherapy signal the dawn of a new era in cancer treatment and warrant further investigation to understand the opportunities and barriers for future progress.

Electrochemotherapy in treatment of canine oral malignant melanoma and factors influencing treatment outcome

“…27,28 The clinical experience with melanoma immunotherapies seems promising, with increasing evi-dence that combined approaches may be required to ensure durable responses in the majority of the patients. 29 In this prospective clinical study, we present results obtained from 67 canine patients affected by oral malignant melanomas that were treated with ECT and later followed-up for up to two years. We also discuss ECT benefits in comparison to classic therapeutic approaches and search for factors influencing treatment outcome.…”

The Pathogenesis and Clinical Management of Cutaneous Melanoma: An Evidence-Based Review

“…Such agents purportedly act by directing the person's own immune system to work harder and smarter in attacking cancer cells. Although current immunotherapies only benefit a subset of patients, ongoing research shows promise for the advancement of tumor immunotherapy [33].…”

Challenges of NK cell-based immunotherapy in the new era

“…Ovarian cancer cells have high expression of MICA/B and ULBPs, which can activate NK cells through the active receptor NKG2D [51]. However, immunotherapies, which use NK cells for melanoma, ovarian cancer, and other solid tumors, can control disease progression but limitedly improve or abate disease [76,[78][79][80][81][82][83]. The possible reasons [84].…”