[Guest]

My friend had a melanoma discovered on his abdomen at the time of a hernia repair. The surgeon removed it and found it was a melanoma. He then went back and excised a wider margin around the site. No lymph node evaluation was done to determine the stage of the cancer. Should another procedure be done? What else needs to be done for the initial evaluation beyond a global skin evaluation. Does he need a chest xray? any scanning?
The tumor that was removed was clarks level 2 thickness: 0.39 mm.
Thank you for your time and prompt reply. JAS

[Guest]

In general thin lesions do not require removal of lymph nodes as the risk of
nodal involvement is relatively low (not zero). However, it is unusual to
have melanoma on the abdominal wall and therefore one could consider
undergoing a sentinel lymph node examination. there is no good data to
suggest that having a nodal examination done is of any benefit. Thank you
for using oncologychannel and good luck.

[quote] My friend had a melanoma discovered on his abdomen at the time of a hernia repair. The surgeon removed it and found it was a melanoma... [/quote]