Welcome to this podcast series, Conversations with Professor David Wilkinson! In this episode, Professor David Wilkinson (Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Macquarie University) speaks with Professor Michael Henderson (Deputy Director; Division of Cancer Surgery, Tumour Stream Director; Melanoma and Skin, Peter Mac) about the current landscape of melanoma management.

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Prof Henderson talks about how the treatment of melanoma has significantly changed not just over his career, but even in the past few years. He speaks about the options now available to patients with advanced metastatic melanoma – treatments that offer more hope than ever before and can dramatically improve patient prognosis.

The latest data suggests that 70 per cent or more of patients who receive combination immunotherapy for melanoma are likely to survive five years – an extraordinary feat in comparison to statistics from just 10 years ago.

In the podcast, Prof Henderson speaks about the stage at which primary care doctors should be sending patients on to a melanoma unit, and when referral to these tertiary centres is most appropriate. This includes mention of the latest melanoma management guidelines.

Prof Henderson also discusses sentinel node biopsy and whether this is a recommended or necessary standard of care in melanoma management.

Hear all this and much more in the full podcast above.

Professor David Wilkinson is Deputy Vice-Chancellor at Macquarie University. He is a registered general practitioner and public health medicine specialist. Since 2004, Professor Wilkinson’s clinical work has focused on skin cancer medicine in primary care. He has published research papers on the topic, designed and led development of the only Master of Medicine degree in skin cancer, and helped develop and present a suite of skin cancer short courses delivered by HealthCert Education.

Professor Michael Henderson is a Professor of Surgery with the The University of Melbourne and surgeon in the Melanoma and Skin Service, Breast Service and Sarcoma Service at Peter Mac. He graduated in medicine from The University of Melbourne and trained as a general surgeon. He completed his training with a Fellowship in Surgical Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Centre in Houston. Melanoma makes up a major part of his clinical workload and he is actively involved in clinical and translational research. He maintains an active clinical and translational research interest in melanoma and is supervising several higher degree research candidates.