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Essay On Choroidal Melanoma

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Choroidal melanoma is the most common intraocular (inside the eye) tumor in adults. Choroidal melanoma is the most common cancer of the eye. It originates from the pigmented cells of the choroid of the eye, it is not like other tumors that starts in other parts of the body and then spreads to the eye.
Choroidal melanoma is malignant; it can metastasize and eventually spread to other parts of the body. In COMS (The Collaborative Ocular Melanoma Study) states that choroidal melanoma initially appearing as a small freckle beneath the retina, choroidal melanoma can grow in height and diameter, and may eventually spread to other organs of the body, causing death. Since choroidal melanoma is an intraocular tumor, and therefore usually not seen, patients with this disease often do not recognize the presence of this tumor until it grows to a size such that it decreases vision either by obstruction , retinal detachment, bleeding or other complications. Pain usually does not occur except with large tumors.
In Eye Cancer states that most of the choroidal melanoma patients has no symptoms, the best way to detect this lesion early is to perform periodic evaluations of the retina under dilatation. Patients suffering from melanoma have blurry vision caused if the tumor is …show more content…

Small or suspicious melanomas (those with a height less than 3 mm) are kept under close observation for growth before treatment is started. Medium-sized tumors (those between 3 and 6 mm in height) can be treated with either radiation therapy or enucleation; it has been determined that both treatments prevent the spread of cancer. In large-sized tumors (those greater than 6 mm in height), the treatment of choice is usually enucleation. This is because the eye would not be able to tolerate the amount of radiation that will need to treat a tumor of this size. The COMS study showed no benefit in administering radiation prior to

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