This transcript has been edited for clarity.
Hello. I'm Dr Maurie Markman, from City of Hope. I'd like to present what I consider to be very important and positive objective data regarding the impact that we are having on the management of cancer, in general, and advanced cancers in particular. The paper I'm referring to is entitled, “Long-term survival in patients with advanced melanoma,” published in JAMA Network Open.
I'm referring to a cohort study from the Netherlands using data from the Dutch Melanoma Treatment Registry. These are real-world data we're referring to here. We're not talking about clinical trials. We're not going to talk about patients who were selected based upon excellent performance status. We're talking about real-world patients in this registry who received first-line immune checkpoint inhibitors for advanced melanoma.
In my day, if someone had advanced melanoma and they were beyond the point where it could be potentially resected surgically, survival for the vast majority of patients was measured in months. Sometimes it could be longer, but we did not have effective therapies.
Fast forward to today: Based on real-world data, the progression-free survival for all patients in this database was 23.4% at 3 years and 20% after 5 years. Overall survival for all patients was 44% at 3 years and 36% — so more than one of three patients are alive — after 5 years.
The data show what I said, but if you look at the survival curves, there are plateaus after 5 years, meaning you don't have 6-, 7-, 8-, or 10-year data. Obviously, people passed for other reasons. A very large percentage [of patients], and maybe the vast majority, are cured with this therapy.
Again, these are real-world data, not selected for excellent performance status or because they have the least amount of burden of disease. These were all-comers. One-third of patients were alive after 5 years with a plateau on the curves. This is an extraordinary accomplishment, in my opinion.
An incredible amount of research went into this, including the development of new drugs and figuring out how to give these drugs. I think it is a wonderful but very real example of the incredible power of the community of academics, clinicians, pharma, and basic scientists working for the benefit of our patients. This is the outcome, and surely much more to come in the future.
Thank you for your attention.
COMMENTARY
Real-World Data Shows Promise for Advanced Melanoma Patients
DISCLOSURES
| March 12, 2025This transcript has been edited for clarity.
Hello. I'm Dr Maurie Markman, from City of Hope. I'd like to present what I consider to be very important and positive objective data regarding the impact that we are having on the management of cancer, in general, and advanced cancers in particular. The paper I'm referring to is entitled, “Long-term survival in patients with advanced melanoma,” published in JAMA Network Open.
I'm referring to a cohort study from the Netherlands using data from the Dutch Melanoma Treatment Registry. These are real-world data we're referring to here. We're not talking about clinical trials. We're not going to talk about patients who were selected based upon excellent performance status. We're talking about real-world patients in this registry who received first-line immune checkpoint inhibitors for advanced melanoma.
In my day, if someone had advanced melanoma and they were beyond the point where it could be potentially resected surgically, survival for the vast majority of patients was measured in months. Sometimes it could be longer, but we did not have effective therapies.
Fast forward to today: Based on real-world data, the progression-free survival for all patients in this database was 23.4% at 3 years and 20% after 5 years. Overall survival for all patients was 44% at 3 years and 36% — so more than one of three patients are alive — after 5 years.
The data show what I said, but if you look at the survival curves, there are plateaus after 5 years, meaning you don't have 6-, 7-, 8-, or 10-year data. Obviously, people passed for other reasons. A very large percentage [of patients], and maybe the vast majority, are cured with this therapy.
Again, these are real-world data, not selected for excellent performance status or because they have the least amount of burden of disease. These were all-comers. One-third of patients were alive after 5 years with a plateau on the curves. This is an extraordinary accomplishment, in my opinion.
An incredible amount of research went into this, including the development of new drugs and figuring out how to give these drugs. I think it is a wonderful but very real example of the incredible power of the community of academics, clinicians, pharma, and basic scientists working for the benefit of our patients. This is the outcome, and surely much more to come in the future.
Thank you for your attention.
Any views expressed above are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of WebMD or Medscape.
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