Cost-Effective Patient Selection for Adjuvant Therapy in Stage IIIA Melanoma

Adjuvant immunotherapy with the anti-PD1 monoclonal antibodies pembrolizumab (Keytruda, Merck) or nivolumab (Opdivo, Bristol-Myers Squibb) has documented ability to improve recurrence-free survival (RFS) for node-positive melanoma patients after lymphadenectomy,1,2 and both agents are approved for use by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). At present, there are no available data about the overall survival (OS) impact of these drugs, although we infer that it should be at least as good as that of adjuvant ipilimumab (Yervoy, Bristol-Myers Squibb), which has been shown to improve OS compared with a placebo in these patients.
Source: Journal of the American College of Surgeons - Category: Surgery Authors: Tags: Invited Commentary Source Type: research