The reliability of frozen sections in the evaluation of surgical margins for melanoma. As the width of surgical margins declines, histologic evaluation of the margins is needed to assess the completeness of excision of a malignant melanoma. We studied 221 specimens in 59 patients and compared the interpretations of frozen and paraffin sections from the same block. Frozen sections had a sensitivity of 100% in detecting melanoma when present and a specificity of 90%. 