Analysis of patients diagnosed with primary cutaneous melanoma in the last six years in Hospital Erasto Gaertner: epidemiologic profile

BACKGROUND: Melanoma is one of the conditions with greater increase in incidence worldwide in recent decades. It is a skin cancer with potential high lethality and predominates in Caucasian adults. Treatment of primary cutaneous melanoma is essentially surgical and search for sentinel lymph node can modify the aggressiveness of the treatment. OBJECTIVE: To analyze the epidemiological profile of patients diagnosed with primary cutaneous melanoma, histopathological features and compare with literature data. METHODS: This is a retrospective, observational, single-center, case series study of patients with primary cutaneous melanoma, who underwent surgery between January 2008 and December 2013. The parameters include: Age, sex, clinical stage, date of surgery, tumor location, histological subtype, condition of surgical margins, Breslow thickness, mitotic index, presence of ulceration and metastasis on admission. RESULTS: We included 321 melanoma patients who were treated at Hospital Erasto Gaertner. The population consisted of 58.9% females and 41.1% males with an average age of 52.8 ± 16.3 years. As for the clinical stage, 51.1% were in the initial stage, 24.3% in the clinical stage II (A, B and C), 21.2% in clinical stage III and 3.4% with distant metastases. The most frequent location of the primary melanoma was the trunk, and the histological subtype was superficial spreading pattern. Intermediate and thick melanomas were the most frequent. STUDY LIMITATIONS: This is a retrospective study and some information and data could be incomplete or absent. CONCLUSION: The diagnosis and treatment of melanoma in early stages provides less morbidity and improved survival of patients. Understanding the biological behavior of tumor and knowing the local epidemiology guide health strategies.