Adolescent melanoma: risk factors and long term survival.
OBJECTIVE
To report the adolescent melanomas with focus on differences in clinical characteristics, prognostic factors, disease free (DFS) and overall survival (OS) in comparison with adults.


METHODS
A single institution retrospective study in which 49 adolescent patients were compared to an adult group of 972 patients. The 10-year DFS, 10-year OS and prognostic factors were calculated for both groups.


RESULTS
The median age for the adolescent patients was 17 (range 12-19) years and 49 (range 20-93) years for the adult patients. Median follow-up time was 92 (range 4-366) months. Adolescent patients presented more often with locally advanced melanoma (p<0.01). The median Breslow thickness was 1.6 vs 2.0mm for the adults (p=0.075). Increasing age, ulceration, Breslow thickness, tumour location, male gender and stage at diagnosis were calculated to be negative prognostic factors for the adult group. In the adolescent group, only the stage at diagnosis was a significant negative predictor. The 10-year DFS and OS for the adolescent patients and adult group were not significantly different regarding AJCC stages I-III.


CONCLUSIONS
Although adolescent patients presented more often with locally advanced disease, there are no significant differences in the 10-year DFS and OS between adolescent and adult patients. In our series, we could not confirm the prognostic factors found in the adult group for the adolescent patients, except for the stage at diagnosis.
Daryanani
D
D
Division of Surgical Oncology, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
Plukker
J Th
JT
Nap
R E
RE
Kuiper
H
H
Hoekstra
H J
HJ
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002648:Child; D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D005121:Extremities / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006258:Head and Neck Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008545:Melanoma / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology; D008875:Middle Aged; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D009426:Netherlands; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011379:Prognosis; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D019043:Vascular Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology