The efficacy and tolerability of intermediate high dose interferon alpha 2B treatment as an adjuvant therapy of high risk malignant melanoma [Yüksek riskli malign melanomun adjuvan tedavisinde orta yüksek doz i·nterferon alfa-2B tedavisinin etkinligi ve tolerabilitesi]

There are still ongoing clinical trials and debates about adjuvant treatment of malignant melanoma. Between 1995 and 2004, fourty-nine patients with high risk operated non-metastatic malignant melanoma who had been treated with intermediate dose of interferon alpha were enrolled to the study. Twenty-three patients had regional lymph node metastasis at the time of diagnosis. Patients were treated with interferon alpha 2b (10 million units/day, five times a week for four weeks) as an induction therapy, followed by interferon alpha 2b (10 million units/day interferon three times a week for eleven months) as a maintanence therapy. The median follow-up time was 35 months (range 2-101 months). In this period, 7(14%) of patients had local recurrence, 12 (24%) of patients had regional lymph node metastasis and 20 (41%) of patients had distant metastasis. The 5-years overall survival, disease free survival and distant metastasis free survival rate of patients were 68%, 32% and 54% respectively. Therapy was well tolerated, no grade 4 toxicity related to therapy was observed. Comparing to natural history of malignant melanoma, these results are found to be encouraged.