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Reply to: TNF inhibition for immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced irAEs: the jury is still out

Nature Reviews Rheumatology volume 17, pages 505–506 (2021)Cite this article

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We would like to thank Karijn Suijkerbuijk and Rik Verheijden for their correspondence (Suijkerbuijk, K. P. M. & Verheijden, R. J. TNF inhibition for immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced irAEs: the jury is still out. Nat. Rev. Rheumatol. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41584-021-00640-z (2021))1 on our Review (Chen, A. Y., Wolchok, J. D. & Bass, A. R. TNF in the era of immune checkpoint inhibitors: friend or foe? Nat. Rev. Rheumatol. 17, 213–223 (2021))2, which raises some important issues concerning our analysis of their study assessing the safety of TNF inhibitor treatment for immune-related adverse events (irAEs) from immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs).

In our Review we wrote, “the use of overall survival as the end point might have introduced confounders as some high-grade irAEs (such as colitis) have a higher mortality than others (such as high-grade endocrine toxicity, which can be treated with hormone replacement)”2. Suijkerbuijk and Verheijden are correct in pointing out that melanoma-specific survival was also shorter in the TNF inhibitor-treated patients, suggesting that toxicity-related deaths did not explain the differences in survival. We agree, this omission was an oversight on our part.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Rheumatology, Hospital for Special Surgery, New York, NY, USA

    Anne R. Bass & Allen Y. Chen

  2. Department of Medicine, Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, NY, USA

    Anne R. Bass & Allen Y. Chen

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  1. Anne R. Bass
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  2. Allen Y. Chen
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Correspondence to Anne R. Bass.

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Bass, A.R., Chen, A.Y. Reply to: TNF inhibition for immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced irAEs: the jury is still out. Nat Rev Rheumatol 17, 505–506 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41584-021-00641-y

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