WCCS/EADO 2016 | The future of photopheresis for the treatment of cutaneous T-cell lymphoma

Robert Knobler, MD of the Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria talks about the future of extracorporeal photopheresis for the treatment of cutaneous T-cell lymphoma 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. He begins by expressing that he believes extracorporeal photopheresis is an attractive therapy due to its low side effect profile, something which is not very common in the field of medicine. The optimal timetable on how often this treatment is perfromed must be explored. There are a lot of new drugs for the treatment of cutaneous T-cell lymphoma, which have been reviewed but there has been no major breakthrough. The drugs that are available, such as bexarotene or interferon alpha, can be combined with photopheresis. We know that the preferential treatment of these patients is combination therapy. He explains that looking into the future he hopes that some of the targeted molecules that are being used in other areas of oncology will also be used in the treatment of this disease. The idea is to combine photopheresis with these modern targeted therapies.