Seasonal variation in effect of anti-PD-1 initiation on overall survival among patients with advanced melanoma

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Melanoma is a highly immunogenic cancer, and circannual rhythms influence the activity of the immune system. We retrospectively collected information on all cases with metastatic melanoma (ocular melanoma excluded) that initiated treatment with BRAF-inhibitor-based therapy (BRAFi) or anti-PD-1 monotherapy (PD-1). Cases were divided in two groups based on treatment initiation in the summer half-year (April to September) or winter half-year (October to March). We collected a total of 1054 (BRAF-i) and 1205 (PD-1) patient cases. Median follow-up was 39.7 (BRAFi) and 47.5 (PD-1) months. We did not observe differences in outcomes across patients who were treated in summer versus winter in the BRAFi cohort. Furthermore, we did not observe significant differences in ORR, CRR, and PFS in the PD-1 cohort. However, in patients with BRAF wild-type disease of the PD-1 cohort, treatment initiation in summer was associated with an improved OS (mOS 39.7 months [summer] versus 21.3 months [winter]; HR 0.70, 95% CI 0.57–0.86, p =.0007). This result remained robust to multivariable proportional hazards adjustment (HR 0.70, 95% CI 0.57–0.87, p =.001). Initiation of immunotherapy in summer is associated with prolonged survival in patients with BRAF wild-type melanoma living in Denmark.

Original languageEnglish
JournalPigment Cell and Melanoma Research
Volume36
Issue number2
Pages (from-to)224-231
ISSN1755-1471
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This work was supported by the Herlev and Gentofte Research Council (grant to MD) and The National Board of Health (Empowering Immunotherapy in Denmark, number 05–0400‐18 and 05–0400‐50) (grant to IMS). The DAMMED is currently supported financially by MSD, BMS, Novartis, and Pierre Fabre without influencing data collection or results.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Authors. Pigment Cell & Melanoma Research published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

    Research areas

  • anti-PD-1, environment, immunotherapy, melanoma, season

ID: 334006719