Incidence of Non-Melanoma Skin Cancers in Patients with CLL: A Retrospective Study in Bay of Plenty New Zealand Population
CLLANZ provided some assistance for a research project to be done as a summer studentship, by then fifth year medical student, Andrew Weston, on “second primary malignancies in NZ CLL patients”.
Here is the link to the abstract published at the 63rd ASH (The American Society of Hemotology) Annual Meeting.
Second primary malignancies are important in CLL, where the impaired immune system is not as able to deal to developing malignancies as people with normal immune systems can. As a consequence, about one third of CLL patients die of a second primary malignancy, such as melanoma, colon cancer, and pancreatic cancer. Some of these cancers have well-recognised screening procedures to detect early stage cancers, which can have a better outcome to treatment then, compared to when they are picked up when symptoms develop.
Regular skin checks, and colonoscopy are two good examples of this screening approach.