Updates are available Correction dated 2021-06-02

Article History

Received: 2 October 2020

Revised: 5 February 2021

Accepted: 23 February 2021

First Online: 6 April 2021

Change Date: 2 June 2021

Change Type: Correction

Change Details: A Correction to this paper has been published:

Change Details: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41416-021-01403-z

Ethics approval and consent to participate

: All patients provided written informed consent for participation in the study. The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. This study has been reviewed and approved by the respective Institutional Review Boards/Independent Ethics Committees according to national and international regulations (Supplementary Table InternalRef removed).

: Data are held by the sponsor, Merck KGaA (Darmstadt, Germany), to whom any request for additional data should be addressed.

: T.D. provided consulting for Bristol-Myers Squibb, AstraZeneca, Ipsen, Bayer, Eisai and Becton Dickinson; received research grants from Genoscience and ArQule, and travel grants from Merck. C.B. attended speaker’s bureau for Servier; received research grants from Merck-Serono and travel grants from Daiichi-Sankyo. P.M. has participated in advisory boards for Bayer, Eisai, Exelixis, Ipsen, Lilly, Onxeo, Roche, AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Merck Sharp & Dohme. J.-F.B. has provided consulting for Bayer, Ipsen, Eisai, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Roche and AstraZeneca. J.T. has participated in advisory boards and speakers’ bureau for Merck-Serono, Roche, Lilly, Eisai and Ipsen, and received travel grants from Roche. E.R. has provided consulting for Genoscience and SCOR, and holds stocks with both companies. S.F. has participated in advisory boards for Bayer, Eisai, Ipsen, Merck-Serono and Roche, and attended speakers’ bureau for Bayer, Eisai and Ipsen. E.A., M.W., A.F., V.G., A.I. and E.V. have nothing to disclose. J.S., R.B. and K.B. are employees of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, and hold stock with the company. J.Sc. is an employee of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany.

: The sponsor, Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, provided the study drug and worked with investigators on the trial design and plan, collection and analyses of data and interpretation of results. Datasets were reviewed by the authors, and all authors participated fully in developing and reviewing the manuscript for publication. Funding for a professional medical writer with access to the data was provided by the sponsor for initial drafts of the manuscript. Medical writing assistance was provided by David Lester (Bioscript Science, Macclesfield, UK), Jack Eaton (Syneos Health, London, UK) and Mark Dyson, DPhil (Berlin, Germany), and funded by Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany. All authors had full access to all the data in the study and had final responsibility for the decision to submit for publication.