Finding Your Way with Ocular Melanoma
Episodes
Visiting the Interventional Radiology Suite: Hepzato Delcath
22 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
I recently had the oppotunity to visit the Interventional Radiology suite at UCLA Health to observe Dr. Siddharth Padia give a Hepzato Kit Delcath tre...
Open House: Is Navigating Ocular Melanoma Group For Me?
07 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Navigating Ocular Melanoma group is for people who choose to engage and learn everything possible so they can thrive. Do you have to be struggling to ...
Live Webinar: The Science of Rest - Evidence for Solitude & Self-Care For Health
07 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Without prioritizing Deep Rest, our entire health will decline. Join me in this Health Webinar where you will learn why rest is a biologically essenti...
Vision Loss in Ocular Melanoma
18 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When a person gets newly diagnosed with ocular melanoma, there are two traumatic things that people immediately face: losing sight and losing life. I ...
Navigating Ocular Melanoma Group Support Program - January 2026
17 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Nothing has been more inspiring to me than working closely with people who are open to engaging full-on with their mind-body health: to gaining knowle...
Why Your Voice Matters: How Patients (Not Doctors) Move the Needle in Medical Progress
18 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
How does medical progress happen? What drives the adoption of new techniques and better patient outcomes? It is patient themselves who drive progress,...
Unexpectedly Low Rate of Metastasis & Death Among Patients Treated for Uveal Melanoma with Brachytherapy, Vitrectomy and Silicone Oil
10 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The data from a cohort of my patients who live in Nevada took me by surprise. I acknowledge the work of Alex Rivas, a University of Nevada medical stu...
How Can Acupuncture Help With Ocular Melanoma?
06 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Learn why adopting complementary health approaches, such as acupuncture can help boost your overall mind-body health. For your immune system to be boo...
How Do I Treat A Patient With Choroidal Melanoma?
10 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Treating a patient with choroidal melanoma (otherwise known as uveal melanoma or ocular melanoma), starts with a thorough evaluation - history, ocular...
Isolation And Ocular Melanoma: Why Support Matters
02 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Getting diagnosed with ocular melanoma may be an isolating experience - few have heard of this type of cancer, let alone have an understanding of the ...
Live Webinar: What To Know About Ocular Melanoma Biopsy
29 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If you missed the Live Webinar, welcome to this Episode! It's all here. Learn and get your questions answered about everything to know about ocular me...
Doctor's Visit Survival Guide For Ocular Melanoma
27 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Just diagnosed with ocular melanoma or other unusual medical condition? If you've been feeling overwhelmed, confused, or unsure what to ask your docto...
Ocular Melanoma Plaque Surgery Explained: Empower Yourself
25 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When you find yourself entering a situation that is completely foreign, it is imperative that you teach yourself everything - read, learn, ask questio...
What Stage Is My Ocular Melanoma?
13 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In cancer of most parts of the body a Stage from 1 to 4 is often assigned at various time points in the cancer journey. This may help to predict progn...
Is Ocular Melanoma Related to Skin Melanoma?
05 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Although they share the same name - "melanoma" - the two cancers are cousins at best. Here are the differences - the tumor mutations between eye and s...
What If My Treated Ocular Melanoma Is Not Shrinking?
03 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
After you have had radiation treatment to destroy the ocular melanoma, what's left of your tumor is no longer viable. Radiation destroys the cellular ...
Ocular Melanoma Resource: Handbook For Patients And Families
30 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Finding Your Way With Ocular Melanoma: A Handbook For Patients and Families was created to serve as an all-in-one-place resource, written by one of th...
Newly Diagnosed With Ocular Melanoma? Your First 30 Days
27 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If you've been told that you may have an eye cancer, ocular melanoma, uveal melanoma, or even an unusual freckle, mole, nevus or lesion - it's time to...
Did You Get A Second Opinion?
22 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Did you get a second opinion? I cannot stress how important it is for EVERYONE to get a second opinion when you have been diagnosed with an ocular mel...
Getting Through Your Ocular Melanoma Surgery
21 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Going through the recovery of your ocular melanoma surgery can be a daunting experience. Learn about the reasons for eye pain, redness, swelling and w...
Retinal Detachment In Ocular Melanoma
16 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What is a retinal detachment? In most cases, retinal detachment is caused by a rip in the retina (i.e., retinal tear) from pulling of the vitreous hum...
Small Melanomas: How To Think About Whether Or Not To Treat
14 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When is the right time to treat a small melanoma? The biggest take-home message if you have a small suspicious lesion or a small uveal melanoma, is th...
Worrying About Losing Vision In The Melanoma Treated Eye
09 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Have you been told that you will likely go blind after ocular melanoma treatment and that there is little that can be done? Have you been told you mig...
Does Bleeding in the Eye Increase My Risk of Metastasis? (No!)
07 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
By definition, cancers grow their own blood supply in order to invade and grow in tissue where they don't belong. The blood vessels in ocular melanoma...
Is It Safe To Biopsy An Ocular Melanoma?
01 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
At the beginning of your journey with ocular melanoma, a question about performing a biopsy may arise. Performing biopsy for molecular prognostication...
Getting Cataract Surgery in the Non-Melanoma Eye
30 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Cataract surgery is the most common operation performed in the entire world. It is one of the safest, quickest and most effective eye surgeries to ach...
How To Speed Up Recovery From Ocular Melanoma Surgery
24 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Brachytherapy plaque surgery is a complex eye operation that involves the external tissues of the eye and orbit. This can result in swelling and edema...
Should Prognostic Biopsy Results Change Your Treatment Plan?
22 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Your ocular melanoma treatment plan consists of two main items: 1) What you do to treat the cancer in your eye, and 2) What you do to watch for and tr...
What To Do About Red Eye After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
18 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Red eye is common after ocular melanoma surgery, after the period of recovery and sometimes episodes of red eye may occur long after your treatment. L...
Diagnosis Day: Finding Your Strength in The Storm
09 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Getting diagnosed with ocular melanoma may be one of the most difficult experiences in your life. You may have seen multiple eye-care providers who we...
Closing The Gap Between Ocular Oncologists: Introducing OMG (Oncology Mentoring Group)
08 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Why is ocular oncology an unusual subspecialty in medicine? It is unusual because standards of care vary between institutions and between ophthalmolog...
What Have You Learned? Embracing Challenges As Opportunities
19 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Pause for a moment and ask yourself - What have I learned lately from my life? From this ocular melanoma journey and other important events in my life...
When Medicine Becomes Mindless: The Cost of Formulaic Care in Ocular Oncology
07 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This episode was inspired by my new-found knowledge of the work of legendary Harvard health psychologist Ellen J. Langer, PhD. Dr. Langer defines "min...
Why So Many Tests? Understanding Imaging Studies in Ocular Melanoma
28 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Whether you have a benign lesion that is being monitored, whether you are seeing an ocular oncologist for the first time to have something suspicious ...
Sneak Preview - Webinar on Role of Mindset in Cancer Survival 2/23/25 10AM PST
22 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This Sunday, Feburary 23,2025 at 10AM PST I will be hosting my next live webinar on the topic, "The Role of Mindset in Cancer Survival: Science of a H...
How to Stay Engaged With Ocular Melanoma After Enucleation
17 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When the ocular melanoma is discovered and the tumor is too large for eye-saving treatment, the ocular oncologist will recommend enucleation. Enucleat...
How to Prepare for Your Ocular Oncology and All Doctor Visits
07 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Have you ever left your doctor's appointment feeling rushed and somewhat confused regarding your healthcare options? Do you find that it's hard to get...
Inflammatory Pain After Brachytherapy - Signs, Symptoms & Solutions
02 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Inflammatory pain after brachytherapy is fairly common. The dying tumor causes the nearby tissues of the eye, eye-socket (orbit) and sometimes the adj...
Beyond the OCT: Holistic Approach to Radiation Retinopathy Treatment
31 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
One of the most useful imaging tests invented in the history of ophthalmology is Optical Coherence Tomography, or OCT. The OCT is used to image the ma...
How to Heal Your Doctor-Patient Relationship
17 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Why is the Doctor-Patient relationship so important? Because the positive-mindset of a care-provider will result in better health outcomes for the pat...
My New Book for Patients & Families: Finding Your Way With Ocular Melanoma
14 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
🎉 Exciting Announcement 🎉 I’m thrilled to share that my new book, Finding Your Way With Ocular Melanoma, is now available. As an ocular oncol...
What To Do About Worsening Vision After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
03 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If you notice worsening vision after ocular melanoma treatment, always get it checked out. You must have an explanation why the vision is declining. N...
When The Cancer in the Eye is Not Ocular Melanoma
24 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The most common intraocular cancer of adults is actually NOT ocular melanoma. The most common intraocular malignant tumor to be found in the eye is a ...
Navigating Ocular Melanoma - The Guided Group Program
20 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This episode is all about Navigating Ocular Melanoma - The Guided Group Program, which starts January 5, 2024. I am thrilled to do this work, because ...
Advancing Survival - A Holistic Approach to Ocular Melanoma
15 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What can you do to improve your mind, body and spirit? Whether you have ocular melanoma or any other medical condition, there is always something you ...
Pan-Retinal Laser Photocoagulation After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
23 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When does a patient need to have pan-retinal laser photocoagulation (otherwise known as "PRP") after ocular melanoma treatment? PRP laser is an import...
Webinar: Advancing Survival - A Holistic Approach to Ocular Melanoma
16 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Mark your calendars - please join me on Sunday, December 15th at 10:00-11:30AM PST. Register for the webinar below. I will share with you what a holis...
Making Decisions From A Place of Fear
15 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
There is much that is scary and frightening when one discovers that the diagnosis is ocular melanoma. However, there is also a tremendous amount of ex...
How to Manage Eye Pain After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
11 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Pain after ocular melanoma treatment may be due to dry eye, late onset inflammation, and from elevated eye pressure from new blood vessels forming in ...
White Lights & Flashing After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
09 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Some people notice the recurrence of white lights and flashing in the treated melanoma eye within a year or so after the radiation treatment. This sym...
What Causes Ocular Melanoma?
06 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What causes ocular melanoma? There is nothing you can do to prevent getting ocular melanoma. We know that past trauma, UV exposure and all sorts of en...
Why Aren't All Ocular Oncologists Offering Prognostic Biopsy?
03 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Getting a fine needle biopsy from an ocular melanoma can reveal information about one's prognosis - whether a person has a low risk or a higher risk o...
What to Do If You Get Diagnosed With Metastasis
01 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Early detection of metastasis results in the ability to consider more treatment options for your situation, than if metastasis is discovered late. Pre...
McCannel's Ocular Melanoma Resources - All in One Place
30 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to my new resource website: seyhart.com/ocularmelanoma! While I may not be able to serve as everyone’s ocular oncologist, I’ve shared my e...
Managing Anxiety About Metastasis in Ocular Melanoma
23 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The uncertainty of not knowing for sure what and when is going to happen to you after an ocular melanoma diagnosis, can be a major issue that patients...
Looking Good After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
27 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You've just been through a brachytherapy plaque surgery - hooray its behind you. Your eye is red, your eyelid is drooping, the eye keeps watering - yo...
Does My Doctor's Bedside Manner Matter?
27 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What is bedside manner? In healthcare as this relates to your doctor, bedside manner refers to how he or she interacts with you - the communication, t...
Facing the Idea of Ocular Melanoma Metastasis
07 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Getting a diagnosis of ocular melanoma may be a traumatic and emotional time. The possibility of your cancer being fatal may be the most challenging a...
Risk Factors for Metastasis in Ocular Melanoma
29 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The number one risk factor for the ocular melanoma metastasizing to the liver is the size of the tumor at the time of diagnosis. The larger the size o...
Vision Improvement Years After Plaque Brachytherapy
07 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Is it possible for vision to improve years later after brachytherapy plaque treatment and radiation side-effects? Yes! This is a phenomenon that is no...
Intravitreal Injections After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
02 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Intravitreal injections are shots of medicine that go into ("intra-") the eye ball and directly into the vitreous cavity ("vitreal"), the innermost pa...
Ocular Melanoma Metastasis - Overview with Bartosz Chmielowski, MD
01 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In today's episode, I welcome my friend and colleague of nearly two decades, Professor of Medicine, Division of Hematology-Oncology at UCLA, Dr. Barto...
How Do You Prevent Radiation Retinopathy?
30 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Radiation damage is an irreversible, non-fixable, and un-curable state. Thankfully this is exactly what we need to destroy cancer. However, when healt...
How Do You Treat Radiation Retinopathy?
29 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Radiation retinopathy occurs when the healthy non-tumor tissue of the retina gets damaged by the radiation that is intended for the ocular melanoma un...
What is Radiation Retinopathy?
29 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Radiation retinopathy is when the vessels of the retina are damaged because of the side effect of the radiation treatment necessary to kill the ocular...
Side Effects of Ocular Radiation Treatment
23 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What are the side effects of ocular radiation treatment? Whether one is undergoing brachytherapy plaque, external beam radiotherapy, gamma knife radio...
Tumor Biopsy - Biopsy Techniques and Safety
19 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We continue our topic of Tumor Biopsy, with a focus on some different techniques, how the biopsy is performed and also addressing safety of tumor biop...
Tumor Biopsy - Why Get a Biopsy in Ocular Melanoma
19 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Why would one need to get a biopsy in the setting of ocular melanoma? I discuss some reasons why: 1) To get pathology in cases where a clinical diagno...
Double Vision After Ocular Melanoma Surgery
05 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It is very normal to have double vision right after ocular melanoma surgery, due to the edema and swelling of all the tissue in the orbit that can squ...
Why I Discourage Eye-Patching After Ocular Melanoma Surgery
29 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Using your treated melanoma eye together with your fellow better-seeing eye as soon as possible after your radiation surgery is the fastest way to vis...
Living with Decreased Vision After Ocular Melanoma Treatment
26 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Faced with the possibility of losing sight, a new diagnosis of ocular melanoma can be a time of fear and uncertainty. This may also be fueled by the t...
Confusion with Brain Scans and Ocular Melanoma
19 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Abdominal imaging with focus on the liver is the key way to monitor for spread of ocular melanoma (metastasis). However, sometimes patients may get a ...
What to Do About the Cataract in my Good Eye?
03 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Are you someone who has been told "to wait as long as possible" to have cataract surgery in your good eye, because you have poor vision in the eye tha...
Getting a Second Opinion
03 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Have you been given a diagnosis of ocular melanoma and you want to get another opinion for confirmation? Or you just want to learn more about what oth...
Tumor Recurrence
23 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What is tumor recurrence? Another more technical term for this is "local treatment failure" - when the original surgery or treatment procedure to dest...
What To Expect When the Plaque is On the Eye
30 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Immediately after the initial plaque placement surgery has been completed, what can one expect over the following days that the plaque is on the eye? ...
What Happens in Plaque Surgery for Ocular Melanoma?
30 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What exactly happens in plaque surgery? Learn about the steps in surgery, how the surgeon gets exposure of your eye surface to place the plaque, and h...
Post-Radiation Fatigue
30 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Feeling unusually exhausted about a month after your radiation treatment is a fairly common phenomenon among patients. Most importantly it goes away i...
All About Enucleation
25 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What is involved in enucleation surgery? What is it like to have a prosthesis? What are the situations where I might need to consider having an enucle...
Proton Beam Radiotherapy - An Overview
25 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How is getting proton beam treatment different than plaque brachytherapy? During my fellowship training, proton beam treatment at the Northwest Proton...
The Radiation Plaque
23 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The most common way to treat an ocular melanoma is by using seeds of radiation of a specific isotope, usually Iodine-125 or Palladium-103, that are co...
Glaucoma in the Setting of Ocular Melanoma
21 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
There is an 8.6% incidence of developing glaucoma after plaque brachytherapy in ocular melanoma. Glaucoma is a highly treatable disease in the field o...
Overview of the Eye and Ocular Melanoma Diagnosis
15 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we chat about the human eyeball, where ocular melanoma forms in relation to the structures of the eye, symptoms that might happen wit...
Welcome to Finding Your Way With Ocular Melanoma - host Tara McCannel MD PhD
14 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Why do I believe we need a podcast about Ocular Melanoma authored by a physician? Welcome to Finding Your Way with Ocular Melanoma, a guide to underst...