Open AccessThe association between tumor mutational burden and prognosis is dependent on treatment context
Author(s) -
Cristina Valero,
Mark Lee,
Douglas R. Hoen,
Jingming Wang,
Zaineb Nadeem,
Neal Patel,
Michael A. Postow,
Alexander N. Shoushtari,
George Plitas,
Vinod P. Balachandran,
J. Joshua Smith,
Aimeé M. Crago,
Kara C. Long Roche,
Daniel Kelly,
Robert M. Samstein,
Satshil Rana,
Ian Ganly,
Richard J. Wong,
A. Ari Hakimi,
Michael F. Berger,
Ahmet Zehir,
David B. Solit,
Marc Ladanyi,
Nadeem Riaz,
Timothy A. Chan,
Venkatraman Seshan,
Luc G.T. Morris
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
nature genetics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 18.861
H-Index - 573
eISSN - 1546-1718
pISSN - 1061-4036
DOI - 10.1038/s41588-020-00752-4
Subject(s) - context (archaeology) , immunotherapy , medicine , oncology , cancer , biology , immune checkpoint , overall survival , immune system , survival analysis , immunology , paleontology
In multiple cancer types, high tumor mutational burden (TMB) is associated with longer survival after treatment with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs). The association of TMB with survival outside of the immunotherapy context is poorly understood. We analyzed 10,233 patients (80% non-ICI-treated, 20% ICI-treated) with 17 cancer types before/without ICI treatment or after ICI treatment. In non-ICI-treated patients, higher TMB (higher percentile within cancer type) was not associated with better prognosis; in fact, in many cancer types, higher TMB was associated with poorer survival, in contrast to ICI-treated patients in whom higher TMB was associated with longer survival.