Comment on ‘Testing for BRAF fusions in patients with advanced BRAF/NRAS/KIT wild-type melanomas permits to identify patients who could benefit of anti-MEK targeted therapy’

We read with great interest the article from Le Flahec and colleagues encouraging the testing for BRAF fusions in patients with advanced BRAF/NRAS/KIT wild-type melanomas.1 As emphasised in the article, the only viable therapeutic option currently available for patients lacking BRAF point mutations is immunotherapy. However, despite unprecedented efficacy gain, combined immune checkpoint inhibitors therapy only achieves long-lasting response in a third of the patients.2 Thus, considering that BRAF fusions are the most common oncogenic rearrangements in melanoma and that they are clinically actionable, we agree with the authors that their detection in BRAF/NRAS/KIT wild-type tumours is of theranostic importance. To further support the detection of BRAF fusions in melanoma, we would like to comment on some of the conclusions in the light of our recently published article on the subject.3 Our discovery that the nature of the fusion partner can influence the …