National Cancer Immunotherapy Month: How Melanoma Changed Cancer Treatment Forever 

Guest blog post by MRF CEO, Kyleigh LiPira:

Every June, National Cancer Immunotherapy Month highlights one of the most important advances in modern cancer care: harnessing the body’s own immune system to fight cancer. 

Few cancers have benefited more from immunotherapy than melanoma. Once considered one of the deadliest forms of skin cancer when it spread beyond the skin, melanoma has become a remarkable success story in the oncology world. The breakthroughs achieved in melanoma research not only transformed outcomes for melanoma patients but also paved the way for immunotherapy treatments that are now helping patients with lung cancer, kidney cancer, bladder cancer, head and neck cancer, liver cancer and many other malignancies. 

Before the era of immunotherapy, treatment options for advanced melanoma were extremely limited. Patients with metastatic melanoma often faced poor prognoses, and long-term survival was rare. 

Before 1975 there were no FDA-approved drugs for melanoma. Between 1975 and 2011, only three melanoma therapies received FDA approval, and the 10-year survival rate for patients with metastatic melanoma was approximately 5%. 

The landscape changed dramatically beginning in 2011 with the approval of immune checkpoint inhibitors, including ipilimumab, followed by pembrolizumab and nivolumab. These therapies work by releasing the “brakes” that cancer places on the immune system, allowing immune cells to recognize and attack cancer more effectively. 

Since 2011, 17 new drugs have been approved for 31 melanoma indications, increasing the 10-year survival rate for metastatic cutaneous (skin) melanoma from approximately 5% to over 50%. For many patients, immunotherapy has turned what was once a rapidly fatal disease into a cancer that can be controlled for years—turning survivors into thrivers with no evidence of disease.  

Melanoma became one of the first proving grounds for immune checkpoint inhibitors because melanoma tumors are often highly visible to the immune system. Researchers studying why some melanoma patients experienced remarkable responses helped uncover fundamental principles of cancer immunology. 

These discoveries led to broader investigations across oncology. Today, immunotherapy drugs first studied in melanoma are approved to treat numerous cancers, including: 

– Non-small cell lung cancer 

– Renal cell carcinoma (kidney cancer) 

– Bladder cancer 

– Head and neck cancers 

– Esophageal cancer 

– Liver cancer 

– Hodgkin lymphoma 

– Certain colorectal cancers 

– Merkel cell carcinoma 

– Triple-negative breast cancer 

Many of the immune checkpoint pathways that were validated in melanoma became the foundation for treatment strategies used throughout cancer care. The success of melanoma immunotherapy demonstrated that the immune system could be a powerful and durable weapon against cancer, fundamentally changing oncology practice worldwide. 

Progress in immunotherapy did not happen overnight. It was built on decades of scientific research supported by patients, advocates, researchers and organizations committed to advancing melanoma science. 

Since 1998, the MRF has funded more than $28 million in melanoma research. The organization’s grant programs support investigators at every stage of their careers from medical students to senior investigators and fund studies focused on prevention, early detection, treatment innovation and survivorship. 

The MRF’s research portfolio reflects many of the most important challenges facing patients today, including improving immunotherapy responses, overcoming treatment resistance, reducing side effects and identifying biomarkers that help predict which patients will benefit most from therapy. 

Recent MRF-funded projects in innovative immunotherapy research will continue to benefit patients and advance knowledge in this field.  

For example, in 2026, the MRF funded a Team Science Award led by Dr. James Mulé titled, “Harness Nanochemical Design to Elevate STING-Based Melanoma Immunotherapy.” STING-targeted therapies are an exciting area of immuno-oncology research designed to stimulate powerful anti-tumor immune responses. 

Researchers supported by the MRF are investigating biomarkers that may help predict immunotherapy success. For example, studies have examined predictive biomarkers of response to neoadjuvant immunotherapy and the role of tumor-draining lymph nodes in forecasting treatment outcomes. These efforts may help clinicians personalize treatment strategies in the future. 

While immunotherapy has transformed care, not every patient responds. MRF-funded projects are also exploring why resistance develops and how it can be overcome. Recent awards have supported research into RNA-based therapeutics for resistant melanoma and strategies to improve anti-tumor immune responses. 

The story of immunotherapy in melanoma is one of the most encouraging examples of how research can transform patient outcomes. 

National Immunotherapy Month is an opportunity to celebrate these achievements while recognizing that research remains essential and more work needs to be done to benefit all patients.  

For patients and families facing melanoma today, the message is one of hope: immunotherapy has changed what is possible, and ongoing research continues to expand those possibilities every year.