Background: The German programme for skin cancer screening was established in 2008 with the aim of reducing skin cancer mortality. However, the effectiveness and risk-benefit ratio of the programme remain unclear.
Objectives: To compare the mortality rates of patients with melanoma who participate in a screening programme to those who do not.
Methods: A retrospective cohort study, based on pseudonymized health insurance data of 1 431 327 individuals from Saxony, Germany, was conducted for the period 2010-2016. Patients with prevalent and incident melanoma were defined based on diagnosis, medical procedures and prescriptions. Patients who underwent screening and had a first diagnosis of melanoma within 2 years of screening were assigned to the intervention group. Relative survival and Cox regression were used to assess potential differences in mortality.
Results: We identified 4552 individuals with prevalent and 2475 individuals with incident melanoma. The percentage of screening participants (n = 1801) who had locoregional (4·2% vs. 13·5%) and/or distant metastases (4·3% vs. 8·0%), or who were treated with systemic anticancer therapies (11·6% vs. 21·8%) was lower vs. nonparticipants (n = 674). Screening participants had significantly better survival rates. The unadjusted Cox model gave a hazard ratio (HR) of 0·37 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0·30-0·46]. After adjusting for named confounders, the effect remained (HR 0·62, 95% CI 0·48-0·80).
Conclusions: Patients who participated in the screening programme had lower mortality than those who had not undergone screening. However, these findings may result from a healthy screen bias and/or overdiagnosis associated with screening, and not from the screening itself.
© 2021 The Authors. British Journal of Dermatology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Association of Dermatologists.