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2013 Tuesday 5th February Liverpool, 11.00am to 3.30pm We had a fantastic meeting in Liverpool on 5th February. Around 40 patients, relatives and professionals attended to hear a wide variety of talks. We were very fortunate to have Professors Damato and Coupland from Liverpool as well as Dr Sara Selig who travelled from CURE OM in the USA. We also heard from Michael Andrew, an ocular melanoma patient, who gave us the benefit of his experience so far. Huge thanks go to our regional representative, Keith Tanner, for his hard work in organising the event, as well as the team from Liverpool - particularly Dawn Roberts. We were very grateful that professional expenses for the event were funded by sponsorship from Delcath Systems. Thanks are also due to Cancer Research UK for their support of the day. Overall it was a great success. If you have any comments or queries from the day, please let Kathryn Curtis know via Kathryn@ocumeluk.org or by calling the helpline on 01276 682190. Please scroll down to view the videos of the day. Overview of uveal
melanoma research in Liverpool
Professor Sarah Coupland Lead of the Liverpool Ocular Oncology Research Group www.loorg.org Prognostication
in uveal melanoma
Professor Bertil Damato Lead of the Liverpool Ocular Oncology Centre www.eyetumour.co.uk Turning personal
struggle into an international fight against ocular melanoma
Dr Sara Selig Director of CURE OM www.cureom.org My journey so far
Michael Andrew Patient Speaker 2012 Tuesday 24th April Birmingham, 1.30pm to 4.30pm Around 20 patients and relatives attended OcuMel UK’s first ever Regional Patient Meeting, held at The Studio venue near Birmingham New Street Station. The purpose of the regional meetings is to allow patients to get together, hear some relevant talks and meet other patients from their area (in this case the West Midlands) however, for our first one we had patients join us from all over the country. We had two main talks – the first was from Mr Mandeep Sagoo who joined us from St Barts and the London where he works as one of a handful of ocular oncologists in this country. He gave us an overview of eye cancer including how and where it forms, and then talked about his approach to the treatment and surveillance of the cancer. Mr Sagoo explained that moles in the eye are common. He took us through how he would decide which moles would need to be watched and at what point a nevus becomes a small melanoma. He went on to talk about the different treatment options he would consider and why and he explained the inherent difficulties of performing biopsies. Finally Mr Sagoo talked about his method of surveillance for extra ocular recurrence which at the time of the talk was twice yearly blood tests and ultrasound scans. He explained that finding an adjuvant therapy to use at the time of eye treatment is of paramount importance and that an international effort was required to get this research happening. The second main talk was from Mr Stephen Fenwick who is a liver surgeon from Aintree which has close links to the Liverpool eye centre and the Clatterbridge Centre For Oncology. He talked about the general principles of liver surgery, including how things have improved. He then went on to talk about the benefit of resection in colorectal patients, relating this then to the surgical resection of ocular melanoma metastases. Mr Fenwick took us through different regional treatments such as SIRSpheres, drug eluting beads, and percutaneous hepatic perfusion. He briefly mentioned the use of chemotherapy, targeted therapy and immunotherapy, before finishing with his thought on the way forward. In Mr Fenwick's opinion, teamwork and collaborative working across the various specialisms involved in the treatment of the ocular melanoma patient is absolutely key to the future of the cancer. He feels this would best be served in specialist centres around the country. His final thought was the same as Mr Sagoo about the necessity for research, but this time with the focus on treatments used at the point the cancer has spread. We were also very lucky to have two nurse specialists at the meeting – Louise Jones who
talked about her work with the liver patients in Aintree, and Donna Begg who told us about the SUAVE trial in Birmingham. Slides from Mandeep Sagoo's talk |