skin

Mayo Clinic dermatologist who led ERIVANCE, the trial that established vismodegib, the first Hedgehog pathway inhibitor, for advanced basal cell carcinoma.

Athens dermatologist who led the trial showing that cemiplimab works in advanced basal cell carcinoma after Hedgehog inhibitors have failed, and who co-authors the European skin cancer guidelines.

Basal cell carcinoma is a skin cancer and the most common cancer of all, caused by sun exposure and almost never life-threatening. Nearly all are removed surgically; the rare advanced cases are treated with drugs that block the hedgehog signalling pathway, and with immunotherapy if those fail.

Bowen's disease is the earliest form of squamous cell skin cancer: abnormal cells fill the outer layer of the skin but have not broken through it, so it cannot spread. It looks like a red, scaly patch, often on the lower leg, and it is usually cured by a cream, freezing, light treatment or a small operation.

The professional body that writes the UK's skin cancer service standards and, because these cancers have almost no charity of their own, also writes most of the patient information a person with a basal cell carcinoma will be handed.

Cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma is a sun-related skin cancer with over a million US cases a year, almost all cured by removing them. The 2 to 5% that grow deep or spread respond to PD-1 immunotherapy (cemiplimab, pembrolizumab), which is now also given after surgery in high-risk cases; transplant recipients cannot safely receive it.

Melbourne oncologist who led C-POST, the trial that showed cemiplimab after surgery and radiotherapy cuts recurrence in high-risk cutaneous squamous-cell carcinoma.

The Nottingham epidemiologist who founded British evidence-based dermatology and ran the trial that answered whether a cream can replace surgery for the commonest cancer there is.

The British trial testing whether the immunotherapy that works for advanced squamous cell carcinoma also works, first line, for the advanced basal cell carcinomas NICE refused to fund a hedgehog inhibitor for.

Marseille dermatologist who led KEYNOTE-629, which established pembrolizumab for advanced cutaneous squamous-cell carcinoma, and who has been a senior investigator on many European melanoma trials.

Kaposi sarcoma is a blood-vessel cancer caused by the herpesvirus HHV-8, made famous by the AIDS epidemic. In people with HIV, antiretroviral therapy alone often shrinks it; liposomal doxorubicin or paclitaxel treat advanced disease, and it remains among the commonest cancers in sub-Saharan Africa, where paclitaxel is often unaffordable.

The skin cancer that proved immunotherapy works: half of advanced patients now live 10 years. Also the first with an approved TIL therapy, an oncolytic virus, and a positive phase 3 personalised vaccine.

The UK melanoma charity whose free nurse helpline is the one place a frightened person can ask a specialist skin cancer nurse a question without waiting for an appointment, and which says up front that it cannot tell you from a photograph.

Merkel cell carcinoma is a rare, fast-growing skin cancer, usually caused by a common virus (Merkel cell polyomavirus) or by sun damage. Once it had spread there was no treatment that worked; PD-1/PD-L1 immunotherapy now gives lasting responses in about half of patients.

Houston dermatologist who led the trials that established cemiplimab, the first drug approved for advanced cutaneous squamous-cell carcinoma, and sonidegib for basal cell carcinoma.

The trial that tested whether giving GPs a diagnostic gadget would make their skin cancer referrals better, found that it made them more numerous instead, and is the reason the NHS asks for training and dermoscopy rather than devices in primary care.

Houston surgeon who led the trial showing that giving cemiplimab before surgery can eliminate cutaneous squamous-cell carcinoma in about half of patients, sparing many from extensive operations.

The only randomised trial ever attempted in Merkel cell carcinoma, run from Birmingham, closed to recruitment in 2018, and with no published result on its registry record: the reason the first treatment decision in this cancer is still made on opinion.

The trial testing a thing the NHS already does without evidence: giving radiotherapy after surgery for a high-risk squamous cell carcinoma, to stop it coming back.

Seattle oncologist who led STAMP, the trial that showed pembrolizumab after surgery reduces recurrence of Merkel cell carcinoma, a rare and aggressive skin cancer.

Sirolimus is an anti-rejection tablet taken after an organ transplant. Switching to it from a calcineurin inhibitor roughly halves the number of new skin squamous cell carcinomas in people who have already had one, at the cost of more side effects and a quarter of people stopping it.

The prevention charity that campaigns on the one lever in skin cancer that is bigger than any drug: what the country does about ultraviolet exposure, and what it charges for sunscreen.

Skin cancer is the commonest second cancer after almost any treatment, and the commonest one left out of the counts, because registries record non-melanoma skin cancers inconsistently or not at all. Most are basal cell carcinomas, most are curable when treated, and the practical answer is to look at irradiated skin and to have anything that bleeds, crusts or does not heal in six weeks examined.

A prevention trial for the group who get these cancers worst: people on long-term immunosuppression, for whom squamous cell carcinoma is not an event but a recurring condition.

A melanoma inside the eye that is biologically unrelated to skin melanoma: different mutations, no response to standard immunotherapy, and a tendency to spread to the liver years later. Tebentafusp is the first drug ever to extend survival in the metastatic disease.