A Prospective Study of Intraarterial Infusion Chemotherapy in Advanced Wild-Type BRAF Melanoma Patients

Background Treatment strategies for advanced cutaneous melanoma (CM) patients, resistant or not treatable with novel target and immunotherapeutic drugs, remain a significant challenge, particularly for patients with unresectable stage IIIC/D disease localized to inferior limbs and pelvis, for whom specific outcomes are rarely considered. Materials and methods This is a prospective study of multidisciplinary treatments, including locoregional melphalan chemotherapy, in 62 BRAF wild-type CM patients with locoregional metastases in the inferior limbs and pelvis, including inguinal regions. Patients were either in progression following or ineligible for, or not treatable with novel immunotherapy. For exclusively inferior limb-localised disease, patients received locoregional melphalan chemotherapy performed by hyperthermic isolated limb perfusion (n = 19) or isolated limb infusion (n = 19), and for synchronous lesions localised to inferior limbs and pelvis, received hypoxic pelvic and limb perfusion (n = 24). Additional multidisciplinary therapy included local, locoregional and systemic treatments and the primary endpoint was tumour response. Results The objective response rate following first cycle of locoregional chemotherapy was 37.1% at 3 mo and median progression-free survival was 4-mo, with 12.9% procedure-related complications, 30.6% low-grade haematological toxicity and 11.3% severe limb toxic tissue reactions. Multivariate logistic regression showed that the odds of response were significantly higher for patients ≤ 75 y of age and for patients with locoregional metastases exclusively located in the inferior limbs. Conclusion In this subgroup of CM patients with BRAF wild-type status, locoregional metastases localized to inferior limbs and pelvis, in progression following or ineligible for immunotherapy, melphalan locoregional chemotherapy demonstrated a safe and effective profile. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier NCT01920516; date of trial registration: August 6, 2013.