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Using patient and melanoma tissue information to predict the risk of cancer spreading to the lymph nodes (CP‐GEP tool)
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
british journal of dermatology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.304
H-Index - 179
eISSN - 1365-2133
pISSN - 0007-0963
DOI - 10.1111/bjd.19904
Subject(s) - lymph , melanoma , medicine , lymph node , skin cancer , cancer , sentinel lymph node , dermatology , pathology , breast cancer , cancer research
Linked Article: Mulder et al. Br J Dermatol 2021; 184 :944–951. Melanoma is the most deadly type of skin cancer that develops in skin pigment cells. It affects about 132,000 people worldwide each year. The prognosis (predicting the outcome) in newly diagnosed patients strongly depends on the presence of spread from the skin into regional lymph nodes (glands) or even further into other parts of the body, such as the lungs and bones. Knowledge on whether the lymph nodes are affected by melanoma cells influences the type of cancer treatment given to patients. This is currently established by removal of the draining lymph node(s) of interest, a procedure that is known as a surgical sentinel lymph node biopsy. Cancer spread into the lymph node is present in roughly two out of 10 patients who undergo this procedure. Therefore, in the majority of patients this biopsy will not lead to a different treatment plan, but removing the lymph node(s) can lead to complications in one or two out of 10 patients. The CP‐GEP tool was developed in a study of patients in the USA to calculate the risk of cancer spread into the lymph nodes. This study aimed to find out whether this tool could be of benefit in European patients as well. To calculate the risk (‘high’ or ‘low’), this tool combines information from the patient (age) and melanoma tissue (depth of the tumour and cancer genes). We compared the risk with the presence or absence of melanoma spread into the lymph nodes. This study shows that the CP‐GEP tool can identify patients with melanoma who have a low risk of lymph node spread. In conclusion, the CP‐GEP tool can be helpful to reduce the number of lymph node operations (and complications) in patients with melanoma.