Medical Treatments for Skin Cancer

Surgery is usually enough to treat non-melanoma skin cancers. On the other hand, melanoma is more likely to metastasize, requiring one of a number of other methods:

• Biological therapy involves cytokines, or proteins that activate the immune system in a general way. According to the American Cancer Society (ACS), interferon-alpha and interleukin-2 can help shrink nearly 10 percent to 20 percent of advanced-stage melanomas.
• Chemotherapy is the use of drugs to kill fast-growing cells, including cancer cells. In early stages or precancerous stages of non-melanoma cancer, topical chemotherapy is sometimes used. Topical means the medicine is placed directly onto the skin rather than being given by mouth or injected into a vein. Otherwise, systemic chemotherapy, which is given in a vein, is usually used for more advanced cases of melanoma or when non-melanoma has spread.
• Immunotherapy is the use of substances that helps the immune system attack the cancer. There are several different types of immunotherapy, including Interferon-alpha and vaccine therapy. Immunotherapy drugs may be combined with chemotherapy.
• Experimental research protocols, such as vaccines and antiangiogenic treatments, are becoming available. Talk to your oncologist. (Antiangiogenic drugs target the natural physiologic process responsible for tumor growth by targeting tumor blood vessel formation and shutting down the mechanisms of cancer progression at an early stage.)

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This article was reviewed and updated June 2007.