Melanoma immunotherapy pair still working at five years, and you can check your skin today

Here is good news about melanoma, a serious skin cancer. A two-medicine combination for advanced disease is still working five years later. And one useful habit, checking your moles, takes about two minutes and you can start tonight.

In a large trial, people with advanced melanoma who got the drug relatlimab along with nivolumab lived longer, and went longer without their cancer growing, than people who got nivolumab alone. The advantage did not fade over time. It held up at the five-year mark.

How the study worked

Researchers followed adults whose melanoma had spread or could not be removed by surgery. Half were assigned by chance to nivolumab plus relatlimab (355 people). The other half got nivolumab alone (359 people). Both were given by IV every 4 weeks. Neither patients nor doctors knew who got which. Everyone was followed for at least 57.3 months, which is almost five years. The results were published Oct. 24, 2026, in Nature Medicine. Some of the extra analyses, such as deaths from melanoma itself and the immune-cell findings, were planned after the fact or were exploratory.

What they found

Three things were measured, and the combination came out ahead on all three: how long people lived without the cancer growing, how long they lived overall, and how long they lived without dying of melanoma.

The survival curves for the two groups pulled clearly apart. The researchers report the largest gaps seen so far in this trial. Side effects stayed in line with what earlier reports had shown.

The team also looked at immune cells. Some tumors have lots of cells carrying a signal called LAG-3. In people whose tumors also had the marker PD-L1 at 1% or higher, high LAG-3 levels went along with worse results on nivolumab alone. Adding relatlimab was linked to fewer cases where the treatment never worked in the first place.

How do the two medicines work?

Your immune system has brakes so it does not overreact. Cancer can press those brakes to hide. Nivolumab releases one brake, called PD-1. Relatlimab releases a second brake, called LAG-3. Using both can give the immune system a better chance to find and attack the melanoma.

The combination was already approved for advanced melanoma. What doctors needed was long-term proof, and this five-year result supplies it.

What you can do today

Tonight, take two minutes to look over your skin. Check for any mole that is new, growing or changing color. Use a mirror for your back, or ask someone at home to look. Take a photo of anything that stands out, so you can compare it next month. If you see a spot that is changing, call your doctor or a dermatologist to have it looked at.