ArticleJournal of the American Academy of Dermatology2025
Improved survival at the population level for patients with advanced Merkel cell carcinoma following availability of immunotherapy.
Article in Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- Article
- Immunotherapy Significantly Improves Merkel Cell Carcinoma-Specific Survival: A Single-Cohort Propensity Score-Matched Analysis.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2026Article
- Association of immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced bullous pemphigoid with underlying cancer type: A lack of association with cancer tissueJID innovations : skin science from molecules to population health · 2026Article
- Poorly Differentiated Neuroendocrine Tumors of the Pancreas: A Comparative Analysis of Primary Versus Secondary Tumors-A Literature Review.Biomedicines · 2025Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundMerkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is an aggressive skin cancer with poor survival rates. Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) were Food and Drug Administration-approved for advanced MCC in 2017, but their real-world survival impact remains unclear.
objectiveEvaluate whether ICI introduction in the United States corresponded with improved survival.
methodsThis cohort study analyzed Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results data for MCC patients diagnosed from 2010 to 2021, grouped by 3-year periods, to calculate 2-year overall and relative survival.
resultsFor 453 patients with metastatic MCC, 2-year relative survival improved from 23% (2010-2012) to 37% (2013-2015), 42% (2016-2018), and 54% (2019-2021) (P < .001). Median overall survival also increased from 9 to 16 months among these patients. In 4786 MCC patients overall, 2-year relative survival rose from 73% (2010-2012) to 81% (2019-2021) (P = .004), while overall survival improved from 67% to 72% (P = .012). LIMITATIONS: Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results lacks case-level data to link ICI treatment directly to survival, although ICIs represent the major recent treatment advance for MCC.
conclusionsThe introduction of ICIs aligns with a >2-fold increase in survival for advanced MCC patients at the population level, translating to ∼220 fewer deaths per year in the United States.
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