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Melanoma & Skin Cancers Center

Melanoma Trials Find out if you're eligible Cutaneous Oncology Program Mission Research Melanoma Melanoma & Skin Cancers Center
Learn more about the Melanoma & Skin Cancers Clinical Trials

State-of-the-art Skin Cancer & Melanoma Therapy at The Angeles Clinic and Research Institute

The Melanoma & Cutaneous Oncology Program of The Angeles Clinic and Research Institute and the Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Center of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center brings together world class multi-disciplinary care built on a foundation of leadership and experience. Expertly guided by Dr. Mark Faries and Dr. Omid Hamid, both nationally and internationally recognized for their academic work, the program boasts clinical care that offers state-of-the-art treatment along with access to the latest investigational agents. An elite center of academic research, the Center is internationally recognized as a premier provider for the comprehensive treatment for all stages of melanoma and skin cancers.

See a complete list of current clinical trials Find out if you're eligible

Cutaneous Oncology Program Mission

Cares for patients with melanoma and other high-risk cancers of the skin from early detection to advanced disease now and into the future utilizing a multidisciplinary personalized approach while conducting leading edge clinical and translational research, with the goal of improving therapy and achieving cures.

The Program conducts numerous, ongoing investigations of new and potentially improved therapies for melanoma and other skin cancers. These include trials of less invasive surgical procedures, novel medical therapeutic approaches for Stage II, Stage III or Stage IV melanoma, metastatic or locally advanced cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, and minimally invasive regional therapy for metastatic ocular (uveal) melanoma. We work to maintain a portfolio of trials that offer opportunities for therapy to patients in many different clinical situations.

Focus on Finding the NEXT Best Therapy

CLINICAL TRIALS DEMAND extreme rigor. A mistake in trial design, like a bookkeeping error, can lead regulators to reject a potentially valuable drug. Read more >

Neoadjuvant therapy:

Neoadjuvant therapy is a treatment option that is being increasingly used for patients with high-risk melanoma. The goal of neoadjuvant therapy is to shrink the tumor before surgery, potentially improving the success of the surgical resection and overall outcomes for the patient.  The most common neoadjuvant therapy for melanoma is immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy, which blocks the immune checkpoints that tumors use to evade detection and attack by the immune system. The immune checkpoint inhibitors approved for melanoma include drugs such as pembrolizumab, nivolumab, and ipilimumab. These drugs have been shown to be effective in both advanced melanoma and in the adjuvant setting, where they are used after surgery to reduce the risk of recurrence.

Neoadjuvant checkpoint inhibitor therapy has been studied in several clinical trials, including the OpACIN-Neo trial and the Keynote-029 trial. These studies have shown promising results, with significant tumor shrinkage observed in many patients. In addition, neoadjuvant therapy with checkpoint inhibitors has been associated with improved overall survival and disease-free survival in some studies.

Another neoadjuvant therapy that is being studied in melanoma is targeted therapy, which targets specific genetic mutations that drive the growth of the cancer cells. The targeted therapy drugs approved for melanoma include drugs such as vemurafenib and dabrafenib. These drugs have shown significant tumor shrinkage in patients with BRAF-mutated melanoma

Overall, neoadjuvant therapy is an important treatment option for patients with high-risk melanoma. While immune checkpoint inhibitors are the most common neoadjuvant therapy used, targeted therapy may also be effective in certain cases. However, more research is needed to determine the best approach for neoadjuvant therapy in melanoma and to identify which patients will benefit the most from this treatment option.

Adoptive T cell therapy (ACT)

Adoptive T cell therapy (ACT) is an innovative cancer treatment that uses the patient's own immune system to target and destroy cancer cells. It involves the isolation and expansion of T cells from a patient's blood or tumor, which are then genetically modified and reinfused into the patient to target cancer cells.  Recent advances in ACT have shown promising results in the treatment of advanced melanoma.

The isolation and expansion of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) from a patient's tumor -  T cells that have already infiltrated the tumor and have shown an ability to recognize and attack cancer cells – and subsequent expansion in the laboratory are reinfused into the patient along with interleukin-2 (IL-2), a cytokine that stimulates T cell growth and activation. The TILs can then migrate back to the tumor and target and destroy cancer cells.

ACT also can involve  genetically engineering T cells to express chimeric antigen receptors (CARs) that can recognize and bind to specific antigens (proteins)  on cancer cells. CAR T cells are produced by isolating T cells from a patient's blood, engineering them to express the CAR, and expanding them in the laboratory. The CAR T cells are then reinfused into the patient to target and destroy cancer cells that express the antigen.

Research

Therapy for cutaneous malignancies, particularly melanoma has improved dramatically in recent years. Members of our Cutaneous Oncology Program have contributed to these advances in much of their work. These contributions include conducting clinical trials with treatments that have now become standard, approved therapies including ipilimumab (Yervoy), pembrolizumab (Keytruda), nivolumab (Opdivo), dabrafenib (Tafinlar), trametinib (Mekinist), T-vec (Imlygic) and tilmanocept (Lymphoseek). They also include leadership of the second Multicenter Selective Lymphadenectomy Trial, which established a new, less invasive standard of care for patients with melanoma lymph node metastases. They were the first in the region to perform minimally invasive lymph node dissections for melanoma. The expertise of our team has led to members being appointed to national and international committees establishing standards of care for these diseases including guidelines panels of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the Society of Surgical Oncology, the American Joint Committee on Cancerand the European Society of Medical Oncology.

Melanoma

Melanoma is the deadliest form of skin cancer. It occurs when the melanocytes in the skin grow abnormally and out of control. Exposure to ultraviolet (UV) rays from the sun and a history of childhood sunburns contribute to the development of melanoma. Researchers are finding that some people may inherit genes that lead to melanoma formation.

Melanomas that are small, shallow, detected early, and treated early have very good cure rates. Untreated melanomas are very aggressive and fast growing. This cancer can quickly spread throughout the body resulting in life-threatening complications and death. Our board-certified, fellowship-trained oncologists utilize state-of-the-art treatments for aggressive, cutaneous, ocular, mucosal melanomas.