Predicting cutaneous malignant melanoma patients' survival using deep learning: a retrospective cohort study

BackgroundCutaneous malignant melanoma (CMM) has the worst prognosis among skin cancers, especially metastatic CMM. Predicting its prognosis accurately could direct clinical decisions.MethodsThe Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results database was screened to collect CMM patients' data. According to diagnosed time, patients were subdivided into three cohorts, train cohort (diagnosed between 2010 and 2013), validation cohort (diagnosed in 2014), and test cohort (diagnosed in 2015). Train cohort was used to train deep learning survival model for cutaneous malignant melanoma (DeepCMM). DeepCMM was then evaluated in train cohort and validation cohort internally, and validated in test cohort externally.ResultsDeepCMM showed 0.8270 (95% CI, confidence interval, CI 0.8260-0.8280) as area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) in train cohort, 0.8274 (95% CI 0.8286-0.8298) AUC in validation cohort, and 0.8303 (95% CI 0.8289-0.8316) AUC in test cohort. Then DeepCMM was packaged into a Windows 64-bit software for doctors to use.ConclusionDeep learning survival model for cutaneous malignant melanoma (DeepCMM) can offer a reliable prediction on cutaneous malignant melanoma patients' overall survival.