Sara Anne,
I allow articles in CURE the same consideration as any other popular press medical article - little to none. Such articles are taken as a call to find and read the underlying journal articles.
"Check Please" was the second urothelial cancer article CURE ran in a year, the first being in September 2016, titled "Rags to Riches", both by frequent author Arlene Weintraub.
The underlying report, "Pembrolizumab as Second-Line Therapy for Advanced Urothelial Carcinoma" is at:
www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1613683#t=articleDiscussion
My biggest dislikes for popular press medical articles is the failure to disclose financial interests of the Author/doctors and the frequent skewed conclusions. In this case, the NEJM report notes support by Merck for TWO of the author/doctors quoted in "Check Please"; the doctors are Dr. Dean Bajorin and Dr. J Bellmunt.
As I read it, "Check Please" seems intended to promote Keytruda over competing products. Favorable outcomes are personalized with photos and praise while serious limitations are softly disposed of in blocks of dense text.
The New England Journal of Medicine article presents a more realistic, if sobering, picture of the potential of Keytruda. Understandably, we all want the outcome of the featured patients in "Check Please".
We can always hope a new treatment will provide spectacular outcomes, but we should not be (mis)lead to expect that they will.
We agree about the mixed feelings.
Best,
Jack