Merck Sharp and Dohme receives NICE approval for Keytruda

Merck Sharp and Dohme's advanced skin cancer drug Keytruda has been approved for NHS use by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

The drug is to be made available on the NHS as a monotherapy treatment for some patients with advanced melanoma which is either unresectable or metastatic.

It comes after the pembrolizumab therapy became the first drug to be approved through the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency's Early Access to Medicine Scheme.

This initiative was established to give patients with life-threatening or seriously debilitating conditions access to medicines that do not yet have a marketing authorisation when there is a clear unmet medical need.

NICE's decision will further expand access to Keytruda, which was approved by the European Commission earlier this year.

UK life sciences minister George Freeman said: "This is good news for the thousands of patients diagnosed with malignant melanoma every year, who can now be treated with this life-enhancing medicine."