Susan G. Komen Austin

Biosimilar pharmalogics are made from living organisms and offer a new and exciting way to treat breast cancer which can be less expensive, have fewer side effects and replicate the results of their chemical based counterparts.Dr. Chen earned her medical degree from the Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania and her Master’s of Public Health from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.  She is a breast cancer medical oncologist and cancer epidemiologist. She works with the Nurses’ Health Study and has published extensively on nutritional, lifestyle, and hormonal factors that influence breast cancer risk and survival.  She also has a particular interest in translating epidemiologic findings to breast cancer clinical practice.  She is currently the study chair for the Aspirin for Breast Cancer (ABC) Trial, a large randomized trial of aspirin vs placebo to prevent breast cancer recurrence run through the Alliance of Clinical Trials in Oncology in the United States. Thank you to our partners who made this podcast possible - Merk and Amgen Oncology.

We are getting more and more sophisticated in determining the types of breast cancer tumors and how they act in the body.  Dr. Knutson and his team at the Mayo clinic are working to discover how biologics play an important role with targeted therapies.Dr. Knutson is internationally recognized in the field of cancer immunology. His research focuses on the immunology and immunotherapy of breast and ovarian cancers, both the basic immunobiology and clinical translation, including clinical trials. His contributions to science include clinical development and testing of self-tumor antigen-specific vaccines in patients with breast and ovarian cancers. He currently has three FDA-approved vaccine trials underway and is principal investigator of 3 Department of Defense grants to test vaccines aimed at preventing recurrence in breast cancer, including triple negative breast cancer for which there are no targeted therapies. Thanks to Amen Oncology and Merck for making this podcast possible.

Jill Ramirez has made it her personal mission to make sure the Latino community in Austin, Texas has healthcare.  She's spent decades educating her community, training community health workers, and making sure Latinos know how to access healthcare. In this episode we talk about the barriers to breast healthcare for this growing community.

Getting back to feeling whole is a vital part of breast cancer recovery.  Having to lose one or more breasts during the treatment phase is not just physically taxing, it can scar mentally forever.  Dr. Fisher and her team work with patients to change that.

Chemotherapy has been a gold standard for treatment of breast cancer and often over-treats women who may not need this aggressive treatment to treat their breast cancer.  Dr. Sparano serves as the study chair for the TAILORx clinical trial sponsored by National Cancer Institute, the first clinical trial integrating a mulitparameter gene expression assay in clinical decision making for adjuvant therapy with early stage ER-positive, HER2 negative breast cancer.  The results will eliminate the use of chemotherapy for thousands of women.

When it's time for reconstructive surgery, there are so many options and opportunities it can be daunting for someone faced with this reality.  Dr. Potter specializes in natural reconstruction and in this episode talks about the options available today.  Board certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery, she completed her undergraduate studies at Princeton University with a focus in Molecular Biology. She received her medical degree from the Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia. Following a Plastic Surgery Integrated Residency at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, she completed a Reconstructive Plastic Surgery and Microsurgery Fellowship with MD Anderson in Houston, Texas. Dr. Potter specializes in natural breast reconstruction and has performed over 750 DIEP flap surgeries using patients’ natural fat and tissue.

Dr. Yankeelov is a Computational Oncologist at the University of Texas where he and his team are working to solve the breast cancer equation. You won't believe how it works - solving for X has never been more exciting!

As a breast imaging doctor, she interprets radiology images such as mammography (including 3D tomosynthesis and contrast-enhanced mammography), breast ultrasound, and breast MRI (including abbreviated MRI). She also does breast biopsies with imaging guidance.  She and her team have pioneered high-risk screening with MRI and offer personalized screening to women with average risk as well as those who may have a high-risk gene,such as BRCA1 or BRCA2.  Herresearch focuses on how best to use newer techniques to detect breast cancer early and to assess whether treatment is working.

Obesity affects more than 35 percent of women in the Unites States. Dr. Liz Welbergs groundbreaking new study, funded by Susan G. Komen, find that women with obesity are more likely to experience a recurrence of breast cancer once their treatment is complete and they may respond to treatment differently. Don't miss this episode!

The decision a breast cancer patient makes about reconstruction isn't an easy one and has long-lasting implications. Dr. Julie Sprunt, Breast Specialist at Texas Oncology, talks about the options, timelines and the benefits of rebuilding or going flat.

When her mother lost her battle to breast cancer, Kyla wanted to make sure other kids like her had a place to go for support - a social media space just for kids who are going through the same thing.  #pinkkids was born!

Dr. Brugge is currently Director of the Ludwig Center at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Brugge has held full professorships at the State University of New York, Stony Brook, and the University of Pennsylvania, where she was named also named as an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. From 1992-1997, Dr. Brugge was Scientific Director of the biotechnology company ARIAD. Her Komen-funded research includes identifying strategies to improve the efficacy of existing and emerging cancer therapeutics, specifically studying how antioxidant compounds contribute to the viability and drug resistance of different subsets of breast tumor cells. Dr. Brugge received the Komen-funded AACR Distinguished Lectureship in Breast Cancer Research and the Susan G. Komen Brinker Award for Scientific Distinction in Basic Science. In this episode, we cover how a cancer cell dies, how it moves in tissue, and what happens when one cell invades another.

May 31st, 2018 Dawn Hershman is a tenured professor of medicine and epidemiology at Columbia University, where she leads their breast cancer program, and a nationally recognized expert in breast cancer treatment, prevention, and survivorship. She is also a Komen Scholar. In this episode, Hershman discusses the different struggles of survivorship and coping with the emotional effects of the treatment. After the treatment, survivors grapple with what has happened to them and the possibility of recurrence in the future. Many struggle with both the health and financial issues they are left with in the aftermath of treatment.

July 7, 1951 - March 26, 2018 Karen Durham was an integral member of the Susan G. Komen family, and we are proud to share this special episode, She will be dearly missed. To learn more about clinical trials: https://bit.ly/1Nb6ilN

Dr. Vineet Choudhry, MD is a general surgery specialist in Austin, TX and has been practicing for 10 years. He graduated from The Texas A&M University System Health Science Center College Of Medicine in 2003 and specializes in general surgery. Dr. Choudhry discusses clinical trials, specifically cryoblation treatment and the FROST clinical trial which freezes early stage breast cancer.

Dr. Adrian Lee is Professor of Pharmacology and Chemical Biology, and Professor of Human Genetics at the University of Pittsburgh. He is also the Pittsburgh Foundation Chair in Precision Medicine. Lee received his B.Sc. and PhD in England, and came to San Antonio for his postdoctoral studies. He was subsequently recruited to Baylor College of Medicine and now the University of Pittsburgh.  Dr Lee serves on numerous other national peer-review committees, and is on the Scientific Advisory Council for Susan G. Komen for the Cure. In this episode, Lee discusses with Suzanne advances in breast cancer research and new ideas in treatment.

"It wasn't until I stepped my foot out the door of my last radiation treatment that the financial chaos started." Marla Blaylock is the CEO of Blue Lotus Systems, but she's also a breast cancer survivor. In this episode, she talks with Suzanne about the financial impact of a breast cancer diagnosis and how it can feel chaotic.

Prior to becoming President of LIVESTRONG in 2016, Greg Lee served as its Chief Financial Officer for nearly 10 years, responsible for the integrity and operation of all financial, accounting, technology and compliance activities for the LIVESTRONG Foundation. LIVESTRONG focuses on the person with cancer, not just the disease itself.  We discuss the financial impact of a cancer diagnosis/treatment as well as more than just the "out of pocket cost" that goes along with it.

African American women experience a significantly higher mortality rate than any other ethnicity. The reasons are complex and Virginia Brown, MA, PhD, an Assistant Professor at Dell Medical School in the Department of Population Health has dedicated her career to helping communities understand why and how this is the case. Our discussion is about more than just breast cancer, it's about figuring out how to make substantial changes in the system to truly find health equity.

Having watched her mother go through breast cancer, Jennifer knew her risk was high.  She shares with us her journey and the steps she took to catch her cancer early and what happened when she became a patient.  Today Jennifer uses her experience to help influence and impact others as a member of the Susan G. Komen Austin Board of Directors.

Dr. Debra Patt is a practicing oncologist and breast cancer specialist in Austin, Texas, and a vice president of Texas Oncology. She is an active leader in breast cancer research, serves on the US Oncology Research breast cancer committee, and chairs the breast cancer subsection of the pathways task force for The US Oncology Network. In this episode she talks about the evolution of breast cancer care and where we go from here.

Susan G. Komen founder Nancy Brinker talks about how it all began and the impact the organization has had on breast cancer.