Vidal, Nahid Y.

BACKGROUND Previous studies examining melanoma biopsy technique have not demonstrated an effect on overall survival. OBJECTIVE To examine overall survival of patients with cutaneous melanoma diagnosed by shave, punch, incisional, or excisional techniques from the National Cancer Database (NCDB). MATERIALS AND METHODS Melanoma data from the 2004 to 2016 NCDB data set were analyzed. A Cox proportional hazards model was constructed to assess the risk of 5-year all-cause mortality. RESULTS In total, 42,272 cases of melanoma were reviewed, with 27,899 (66%) diagnosed by shave biopsy, 8,823 (20.9%) by punch biopsy, and 5,550 (13.1%) by incisional biopsy. Both the univariate and multivariate analyses demonstrated that tumors diagnosed by incisional biopsy had significantly (p = .001) lower overall 5-year survival compared with shave techniques (hazard ratio [HR] = 1.140, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.055 to 1.231). We found no difference (p = .109) between shave and punch biopsy techniques (HR 1.062, 95% CI 0.987–1.142) or between punch and incisional techniques (HR 1.074, 95% CI 0.979–1.177, p = .131). CONCLUSION Incisional biopsies were associated with decreased overall 5-year survival in the NCDB. No difference was observed between shave and punch biopsy techniques. These findings support current melanoma management guidelines.