The following is a summary of “Cutaneous immune-related adverse events are associated with longer overall survival in advanced cancer patients on immune checkpoint inhibitors: A multi-institutional cohort study,” published in the MAY 2023 issue of Dermatology by Zhang, et al.

Up to 40% of immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) recipients experience cutaneous immune-related adverse events (cirAEs), but the impact of these events on survival remains unclear. For a study, researchers sought to investigate the association between cirAEs and survival in ICI recipients.

The study identified ICI recipients from the Mass General Brigham healthcare system and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and reviewed their charts for cirAE development within 2 years of ICI initiation. Multivariate time-varying Cox proportional hazards models, adjusted for age, sex, race/ethnicity, Charlson Comorbidity Index, ICI type, cancer type, and year of ICI initiation, were used to assess the impact of cirAE development on overall survival.

Of the 3,731 ICI recipients, 18.1% developed a cirAE. The analysis showed that patients who developed cirAEs had a decreased risk of mortality (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.87, P = .027) after 6 months, especially patients with melanoma (HR = 0.67, P = .003). Among the different types of cirAEs, lichenoid eruption (HR = 0.51, P < .001), psoriasiform eruption (HR = 0.52, P = .005), vitiligo (HR = 0.29, P = .007), isolated pruritus without visible manifestation of rash (HR = 0.71, P = .007), acneiform eruption (HR = 0.34, P = .025), and non-specific rash (HR = 0.68, P < .001) were significantly associated with better survival after adjustment for multiple comparisons.

The study findings suggested that the development of cirAEs was associated with improved survival in ICI recipients, especially those with melanoma.

Reference: jaad.org/article/S0190-9622(23)00153-6/fulltext