Intraocular Melanoma Health Video

Intraocular melanoma is a form of eye cancer that can be very deadly. Get expert tips and advice on preventing and treating eye cancer in this video.

Take Action

See your eye doctor if you have a dark spot on your iris
Visit your eye doctor if you have blurry vision
Consult your doctor if you have a eye pain

About this Author

Dr. Patel grew up in Texas and studied at the University of Texas at Arlington. In 1996, he graduated as a member of the Gold Key International Optometric Honor Society with a doctor of optometry degree from the University of Houston. Dr. Patel completed a residency in Hospital Based and Geriatric Eye Care at the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Portland, Oregon. During his residency, Dr. Patel served as a clinical instructor to interns from Pacific University and the New England College of Optometry. Dr. Patel has provided hours of clinical procedures workshops for both the Oregon and Alberta, Canada Optometric Associations. He has volunteered his skills on an eye care team in Thailand, and the Special Olympics programs in Oregon. Dr. Patel also serves as a clinical examiner for the National Boards in Optometry, as a consultant to the Portland VA Medical Center, and Adjunct Faculty for the Pacific University College of Optometry.

DR. RAJ PATEL: Hi. My name is Dr. Raj Patel, optometrist at Vancouver Contact Lens and Vision Clinic here in Vancouver, Washington, and I'd like to talk to you a little bit about a particular type of eye cancer called an intraocular melanoma, and it's a disease in which the cancer cells are found in the part of the eye called the uvea. The uvea is the area that includes the iris which is the colored part of your eye, the ciliary body which is inside the eye, it's kind of a muscle that helps control the focusing, and the choroid which is a layer of tissue in the back of the eye. The choroid is next to the retina and that's the part of the eye that lines the inside of your eye. So the uvea contains the cells called melanocytes which contain color and when they become cancerous, that cancer is called the melanoma. Intraocular melanoma occurs most often in people who are middle aged. Some of the symptoms that patients have with these melanomas are a little bit dependent on where that might occur, where the melanoma occurs, where in the uvea it occurs. So if the melanoma starts in the iris, it may look like a dark spot on the iris. If it occurs in the ciliary body or the choroid, the person might have blurry vision or might have no symptoms at all, and so the cancer might grow before it's noticed. Intraocular melanomas are usually found during a routine eye exam, and so when a doctor looks at the inside of your eye when your eyes are dilated with some special lights and instruments, we're looking, doctors are looking to see if there are any particular spots or freckles or areas that we need to keep a little better eye on to make sure that they don't change or develop into something that's cancerous. Some of the other symptoms that patients can have that have melanoma could include--I mean, not always but they can include the iris issues that we talked about which is a dark spot on the iris that is growing in size, a sensation of flashing lights, sometimes if the melanoma is in that focusing muscle, the patient could have blurry vision in one eye and potentially even eye pain. Risk factors for these types of cancers can include iris color and so darker colored eyes tend to be less likely to develop these types of intraocular melanomas, and genetic disposition plays a role so people that have a family history of melanoma are at a little higher risk. The treatment for these types of cancers has many pportunities, one treatment is surgery, taking out the cancer, the other is radiation therapy using high dose x-rays or high dose energy to help kill the cancer cells, laser therapy using an intensely powerful beam of light to destroy the tumor or blood vessels that feed the tumor. So the take home message is that if you're an individual that sees some of these signs on the front of your eye with the iris, the spots in the iris that are changing in size or if you have any vision complaints or if you have a family history or melanoma, make sure and seek out the care of your eye doctor quickly.