Melanoma - Timeline

Hippocrates describes first melanoma; "melas" + "oma"

John Hunter removes the first melanoma, describing it as an “cancerous fungous excrescence.”

Rene Laenec first distinguished melanoma as a separate disease

William Norris first described the heterogeneous nature of melanoma tumors and recommended WIDE EXCISION

Sir Robert Carswell introduced the term "melanoma"

Herbert Lumley Snow started suggesting lymphadenectomy as "traps" for travelling cancer

Up to here, mainstay of treatment was wide excision, 5cm of normal skin and all subcutaneous material. Research into immune systems role underway.

Wallace Clark classified melanoma into three types and correlated depth of invasion inversely with prognosis

Breslow develops a scale of thickness and correlation to prognosis

Morton and colleagues begin using lymphoscintigraphy to resect relevant lymph node beds

Chemotherapy is being used to alternatively treat melanoma

Immunotherapy (IL-2) begins to be used to treat melanoma