Abstract
Purpose :
We performed a retrospective study to report the clinical characteristics and outcomes of patients with conjunctival melanoma at the University of Iowa. Our purpose is to improve future treatment and outcomes by expanding on the limited data on conjunctival melanoma.
Methods :
A retrospective chart review of 26 patients with pathologically identified conjunctival melanoma treated at the University of Iowa were investigated to describe clinical characteristics and outcomes.
Results :
We described 26 cases treated from 2006-2017. We had 16 females and 10 males in our study group. The patients were aged 11 – 91, with an average age of 56. One patient was Asian and the rest of our patient group was Caucasian. There were 9 (34.6%) cases that occurred in the right eye while 17 (65.4%) occurred in the left eye. Of these cases, 17 (64.5%) of them occurred temporally while the remaining 9 (34.6%) occurred nasally. The preceding lesions were noted to be de novo (n=2 [7.7%]), nevus or compound nevus (n=8 [30.8%]), and primary acquired melanosis (PAM) (n=16 [61.5%]). The lesions were stated to be pigmented 92.3% of the time. Initial treatment for all cases included excision for each case. Additionally, the initial treatment for these cases included cryotherapy (n=18 [69.3%]), absolute alcohol application (n=11 [42.3%]), mitomycin-c application (n=12 [46.2%]), and amniotic membrane graft (n=21 [80.8%]). Ten cases received adjuvant therapy of mitomycin-c (n=6 [60%]), cryotherapy (n=1 [10%]), and interferon (n=3 [30%]). Six cases (23.1%) had local recurrence. Three (11.5%) cases were noted to have metastases with 1 stated to have died from the melanoma. Ten cases noted a family history of any cancer and 2 cases had a personal history non-skin cancer related cancers.
Conclusions :
In our patient group conjunctival melanoma tends to occur later in life (average age = 56) with the majority of melanomas arising from PAM (61.5%). The majority of our cases are treated with excision (100%), cryotherapy (69.3%), and an amniotic membrane graft (80.8%). The recurrence rate at the University of Iowa was 23.1% with 11.5% of cases metastasizing.
This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2018 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Honolulu, Hawaii, April 29 - May 3, 2018.