The role of chemotherapy in cutaneous T-cell lymphoma

Larisa Geskin, MD of Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY gives an overview of her talk on chemotherapy for cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL) given as part of a series of lectures on the role of chemotherapy in CTCL, melanoma and squamous cell carcinoma held at the 2016 World Congress on Cancers of the Skin (WCCS) and the Congress of the European Association of Dermato-Oncology (EADO) in Vienna, Austria. Dr Geskin explains that chemotherapy may play little role in the management of these diseases, particularly in the case of CTCL. Multi-agent chemotherapy may only play a role in the palliative setting in CTCL, which is related to the fact that CTCL is a chronic and incurable disease. Therefore, using a potent immunotherapy approach is better than using toxic chemotherapy. For a subset of patients, mostly end stage patients who do not have other options or patients who are in severe pain, multi-agent chemotherapy can be used.