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Whither melanoma in Australia?

B Mark Smithers, Jeff Dunn and H Peter Soyer
Med J Aust 2017; 207 (8): . || doi: 10.5694/mja17.00740
Published online: 16 October 2017

To improve melanoma outcomes, the focus on prevention, early detection and new treatment strategies must continue

Over the past 5 years, we have seen a dramatic response to the intense biological research into late-stage, metastatic melanoma, with therapies targeting melanoma metastases and improving an individual’s immune response to the disease. This has led to an improvement in progression-free and overall survival in a group of patients who would have previously been treated with drugs that had little effect. Intense research and clinical trials continue with the aim of identifying patients most likely to respond, as well as exploring new combinations of therapies with this new paradigm for melanoma treatment.


  • 1 University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD
  • 2 Princess Alexandra Hospital, Brisbane, QLD
  • 3 Institute for Resilient Regions, University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, QLD
  • 4 Cancer Council Queensland, Brisbane, QLD
  • 5 Dermatology Research Centre, The University of Queensland Diamantina Institute, Brisbane, QLD


Correspondence: m.smithers@uq.edu.au

Competing interests:

No relevant disclosures.

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