Melanoma Action and Support Scotland News Round Up: April

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Raising awarness of skin cancer

• The opening of a new charity office that helps people diagnosed with skin cancer has been welcomed by its Bearsden chairperson.

Source: Milngavie and Bearsden Herald 

Footballer opens new skin cancer centre

• A Queen’s Park football player officially opened a new cancer care and support centre in the city.

Source: The Extra 

DUNDEE UTD FOOTBALL STAR OPENS NEW CANCER SUPPORT CENTRE

• Melanoma Action and Support Scotland (MASScot) held their grand opening of the organisations brand new support and retail centre which will help raise funds and provide therapies for melanoma and skin cancer patients along with their carers.

Source: Dundee Messenger 

FDA Panel Gives Thumbs-Up To Amgen's Virus-Based Melanoma Drug

• Two days after the U.S. Food & Drug Administration signaled it might quash Amgen Inc.’s attempt to usher in a whole new class of virus-based cancer drugs, an advisory panel for the agency voted “yes” on the question of whether the company’s experimental melanoma treatment, talimogene laherparepvec (T-VEC), has a favorable enough risk-benefit profile for approval.

Source: Forbes 

The Medical Minute: How artificial tanning can lead to melanoma

• Young women may be up on the latest fashions and trends as they prepare for prom season. But what many don’t know is that the tan that looks oh-so-good with their dress may be the first step toward skin cancer. And cancer is not glamorous.

Source: PSU 

Immunotherapy drug combination shows promise for advanced melanoma patients

• Two immunotherapy drugs could be better than one - at least for a subset of patients with advanced melanoma, according to a preliminary US trial.

Source: CR UK

Bristol-Myers combination melanoma treatment shows promise

• Skin cancer patients taking two Bristol-Myers Squibb drugs that help their immune systems fight melanoma saw their tumours shrink more dramatically than those on a single medication, according to a clinical study. The results from the mid-stage trial give credence to the theory that a combination of “immunotherapy” drugs will lead to a breakthrough in treating one of the world’s deadliest diseases.

Source: FT 

Melanoma’s ‘safe haven’ targeted for shut-down

• MELANOMA cells become drug resistant by using surrounding healthy cells to provide a ‘safe haven’ from treatment, according to new research* published in Cancer Cell today (Monday).

Source: CR UK

Melanoma Tumor 'Dissolves' After 1 Dose of New Drug Combo

• A large melanoma tumor on a woman's chest disappeared so quickly that it left a gaping hole in its place after she received a new treatment containing two melanoma drugs, a new case report finds.

Source: Yahoo 

Rise in UK inquiries for melanoma screening

• INCREASING numbers of Britons are turning to private clinics to look into having potentially malignant moles removed, according to new research.

Source: Scotsman 

BMS' Opdivo backed as melanoma therapy in EU

• Bristol-Myers Squibb's Opdivo has become the first checkpoint inhibitor to be recommended for approval in the EU, grabbing a positive opinion from the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) as a treatment for melanoma.

Source: PM Live

Personalized vaccine shows promise against melanoma recurrence

• Early data from a "first-in-people" clinical trial at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, MO, suggests that personalized melanoma vaccines may provide a powerful immune response against tumor mutations.

Source: Medical News Today 

Skin cancer: 1960s package holiday boom blamed for surge in melanoma cases among OAPs

• The package holiday boom of the last 50 years has been blamed for a huge rise in the deadliest form of skin cancer.

Source: Mirror 

Eyes on Cancer: Help Fight Melanoma

• For hairdressers, Jeanne Braa Foster might add a fifth direction: gab. “If you see something, say something,” she urges. In 2014, Foster and her husband, Dr. Dean Foster, launched Eyes on Cancer, a nonprofit cancer awareness organization that teaches beauty professionals to identify early-stage skin cancer. The course is free and available online. The Fosters have another rule, too: “Check yourself first!”

Source: Modern Salon 

Skin cancer cases in Scotland rise by almost a third

• Cases of skin cancer in Scotland have increased by more than 30% in the past decade, according to latest NHS figures.

Source: BBC 

Skin cancer at work kills 50 a year: 250 cases registered from people who spend time outside through jobs in construction, agriculture or leisure 

• Almost 50 people a year die of skin cancer after being exposed to the sun at work in the UK, research shows.

Source: Daily Mail 

Why spring sun's such a risk for skin cancer: Forecasters predict weeks of good weather. But rushing outside after months indoors can be deadly 

• Dr Andy Dowson is, in his own words: 'not a big fan of the sun'. He'd rather sit in the shade than lie out in the heat. 'I don't go to hot places.' Indeed, family holidays with his wife and three children are spent in northern America 'where the climate is a bit like here,' he says.

Source: Daily Mail 

Bournemouth builders backs skin cancer awareness campaign

• A BUILDERS merchant in Bournemouth has joined forces with Macmillan Cancer Support to raise awareness about skin cancer among men.

Source: Bournemouth Echo 

Conservative candidate Michael Fabricant reveals he has skin cancer

• Michael Fabricant, the Conservative Parliamentary candidate for Lichfield, has revealed he has been diagnosed with skin cancer.

Source: Independent 

Parents of tanning addict who died from skin cancer at just 26 campaign for changes in the law for sunbeds

• The family of a Massachusetts woman who died from melanoma likely caused by her love of tanning are campaigning for a change to laws governing sunbeds.

Source: Daily Mail