Melanoma

Melanoma is a type of skin cancer that is common in both men and women. Its ability to spread to other parts of the body makes it one of the most dangerous forms of cancer. But, if melanoma is found early, treatment can be very successful.

Quest Diagnostics offers an extensive patient education program to help with early detection of melanoma and other skin disorders, through our Dermpath Diagnostics® subsidiary. Visit SpotTheSpot.org for specific steps that patients can take to conduct self-exams and identify spots that may need to be evaluated by a dermatologist.

Quest also offers dermatopathology services through Dermpath Diagnostics, one of the country’s largest dedicated dermatopathology lab networks with more than 75 board-certified dermatopathologists.

Learn more about our services and our dermatopathologists.

LiquidSEQ™ is a liquid biopsy for treatment selection. It provides a comprehensive molecular profile—including 523 genes associated with a broad spectrum of solid tumor cancers—that assesses the DNA only for single nucleotide variants (SNVs), copy number variants (CNVs), and fusions along with genomic signatures, microsatellite instability (MSI), and tumor mutation burden (TMB). This panel would be used if the clinician desires a comprehensive analysis of a patient’s genetic profile from the patient’s blood in the event tissue is not available or insufficient. This panel contains clinically actionable genes as well as emerging genes.

Precision medicine is an emerging approach for disease prevention and treatment that takes individual variability into account. This next-generation sequencing (NGS) panel, along with the computational resources and tools that process and analyze the data, allows the characterization of individual patients and tumor types. Guidelines exist for using results from many of these genes for selection of FDA-approved therapies.

Solid TumorSEQ™ provides a comprehensive molecular profile from biopsy tissue, including 523 genes associated with a broad spectrum of solid tumor cancers, and assesses the DNA and RNA for SNVs, CNVs, fusions, and splice variants along with genomic signatures, microsatellite instability (MSI), and tumor mutation burden (TMB). This panel would be used if a clinician desires a comprehensive analysis of a patient’s genetic profile from tumor tissue. This panel contains clinically actionable genes as well as emerging genes chosen based on alignment to guidelines, drug labels and clinical trials across multiple solid tumor types.

Quest Diagnostics offers next-gen sequencing MelanomaSEQ^® and MelanomaSEQPlus^® Panels, among other testing services, to help physicians develop a treatment plan for navigating within standard of care and clinical trial options.

Sensitivity matters when looking for the smallest evidence of disease, such as residual disease after surgery or response to adjuvant chemotherapy. Haystack MRD^® minimizes false negatives by detecting ultralow levels of ctDNA, providing confidence in therapeutic decisions.¹