Advanced Malignant Melanoma: Immunologic and Multimodal Therapeutic Strategies

[摘要] Immunologic treatment strategies are established in malignantmelanoma treatment, mainly focusing on Interleukin-2 in advanced diseaseand interferon alpha in the adjuvant situation. In advanceddisease, therapies with IL-2, interferon and differentchemotherapeutic agents were not associated with better patientsurvival in the vast majority of patients. Therefore, an overviewof novel immunological agents and combined therapeutic approachesis presented in this review, covering allogenic and autologousvaccine strategies, dendritic cell vaccination, strategies foradoptive immunotherapy and T cell receptor gene transfer,treatment with cytokines and monoclonal antibodies against theCTLA-4 antigen. As emerging treatment strategies are based onindividual molecular and immunological characterization ofindividual tumors/patients, tailored targeted drug therapies moveinto the focus of treatment strategies. Multimodal combinationtherapies with considerable potential in altering the immuneresponse in malignant melanoma patients are currently emerging. Asoncology moves forward into the field of personalized therapies, acareful molecular and immunological characterization of patientsis crucial to select patients for individual targeted treatment.

[学科分类] 肿瘤学