Mucosal melanoma

Mucosal melanoma is a rare form of melanoma, which in principle can originate from all mucous membranes of the human body. These are roughly classified according to location into melanomas of the oral-nasopharynx, digestive tract, and genital area. Primary therapy for melanoma of the mucous membranes is complete surgical resection. Postoperative radiotherapy reduces the risk of locoregional recurrence. Only limited data from small cohorts are available on adjuvant therapy. Response of mucosal melanoma in the metastatic stage is inferior to the established therapeutic regimens of cutaneous melanomas. It is possible that the poorer efficacy of checkpoint inhibition can be explained by lower PD-L1 expression and tumor mutational burden. The presence of an activating KIT mutation should be assessed in patients with metastases, as tyrosine kinase inhibitors such as imatinib or nilotinib can be used for treatment.