Podcasts about pediatric hematology oncology

In today's episode, supported by SpringWorks Therapeutics, we spoke with Christopher L. Moertel, MD, about the evolution of treatments for neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1)–associated plexiform neurofibromas (PN). Dr Moertel is a professor and the Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Fellowship Program director in the Division of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology, a faculty member in the Department of Pediatrics, medical director of the Pediatric Neuro-Oncology and Neurofibromatosis Programs, co-medical director of the Katie Hageboeck Children's Cancer Research Fund Clinic, clinical neuro-oncology leader of the Brain Tumor Program, and the Kenneth and Betty Jayne Dahlberg Professor at the University of Minnesota School of Medicine in Minneapolis. In our exclusive interview, Dr Moertel discussed the expansion of the NF1-associated PN treatment paradigm to include the MEK inhibitors mirdametinib (Gomekli) and selumetinib (Koselugo); the benefits of offering treatment options in oral formulations; the toxicities associated with MEK inhibitors; the importance of managing these adverse effects to ensure long-term treatment adherence; and the need for continued oncology education to optimize treatment outcomes for this population.

Our return guest this week on the Faculty Factory Podcast is Adam D. Wolfe, MD, PhD. Dr. Wolfe shares with us some key communication strategies for better conflict resolution and team building, some of which can also assist with sharing life-altering information with patients in the clinic. The techniques outlined in this episode are designed to help prevent conflict and preserve interprofessional relationships when inevitable tensions arise. Dr. Wolfe is the Interim Division Chief of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at CHRISTUS Children's, affiliated with Baylor College of Medicine in San Antonio, and is also the Associate Professor of Pediatrics and the Program Director of the Pediatric Residency Program. Additionally, he serves as the Assistant Dean of Medical Education and holds the Jann L. Harrison Endowed Chair in Pediatric Graduate Medical Education. “If you start with goals, you can often end a lot of conflict by simply restating what it is you're all trying to accomplish,” Dr. Wolfe said. Not only do many of the strategies outlined in the interview work well with professional colleagues at work, but these same principles often apply to when you're talking to families in a clinical situation, as we learn in the latter stages of this interview. “Do whatever you can to preserve your interpersonal relationships. If you are in conflict, think about how you can preserve that relationship so that person can remain available to you and you can remain available to them… it's what makes this work rewarding,” Dr. Wolfe added. More Resources and Next Steps Visit FacultyFactory.org: https://facultyfactory.org/  Learn more about the GRPI Model of Team Effectiveness: https://www.aihr.com/blog/grpi-model/ Learn more about SPIKES for delivering bad news: https://healthcare.utah.edu/integrative-health/resiliency-center Listen to Dr. Wolfe's first appearance on the Faculty Factory here: https://facultyfactory.org/adam-wolfe/ Contact Dr Wolfe with questions here via email: Wolfe@bcm.edu You can also listen to the Dr. Ludy Shih episode that was mentioned in this interview titled “How to Make Meetings in Academic Medicine Work for You”: https://facultyfactory.org/meetings/

Dr. Betsy Young, a physician-scientist from UCSF provides an overview of her funded work: Tumor cGAS-STING repression drives immune evasion in osteosarcoma and is therapeutically targetable via host STING activation. This work was funded by an MIB Agents 2024 OutSmarting Osteosarcoma YI Hope grant Because of Charlotte.Osteosarcoma (OS) has an immunosuppressive macrophage-rich, T-cell-depleted tumor microenvironment (TME). By performing bulk RNA seq of OS cell lines treated with STING agonist, the lab has defined an OS-specific STING activation signature, which demonstrated a significant protective effect on survival in OS patient samples. In immunocompetent OS models, systemic STING agonism shows curative anti-tumor effects, shifts the tumor microenvironment towards a pro-inflammatory phenotype, and induces immunologic memory. Importantly, host STING activation is sufficient to promote this anti-tumor immunity. The lab has demonstrated that STING activation has anti-tumor benefit in animal models and a protective effect in the human disease, nominating this innate immune sensing pathway as an important therapeutic target in OS.As a physician-scientist and a pediatric oncologist, Dr. Young's aim is to advance the field of pediatric oncology in her research career focused on the immunobiology of osteosarcoma. She completed her Pediatric Hematology/Oncology fellowship training at UCSF, receiving strong clinical training in high-risk pediatric solid tumors and early-phase clinical trials. Now, as a faculty member, she is investigating the pathogenesis of osteosarcoma metastasis in the Sweet-Cordero lab at UCSF, with a specific focus on immuno-oncology translational therapeutics.

The Faculty Factory Podcast invites first-time guest, Adam Wolfe, MD, PhD, to our show this week. He is the co-author of the article, “Put Yourself out There! A Strategy for Effective Self-Promotion in Academic Medicine,” which we examine in detail during this interview. “When it comes to non-clinical teaching, I really gravitate toward things like communication skills, breaking bad news, conflict resolution and self-promotion because those are things that I think are absent in a lot of formative curricula.” he said. Dr. Wolfe is the Interim Division Chief of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at CHRISTUS Children's, affiliated with Baylor College of Medicine in San Antonio, and is also the Associate Professor of Pediatrics and the Program Director of the Pediatric Residency Program. Additionally, he serves as the Assistant Dean of Medical Education and holds the Jann L. Harrison Endowed Chair in Pediatric Graduate Medical Education. More about his article: “Put Yourself out There! A Strategy for Effective Self-Promotion in Academic Medicine”:  https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11219085/  For feedback, questions, or comments, you can also visit the Faculty Factory website: https://facultyfactory.org/ 

Cancer affects over 5,000 children in the Philippines annually. Although highly treatable, late diagnoses and other factors contribute to the country's low survival rate of just 30%.In this B-Side episode, we speak with Dr. Ana Patricia A. Alcasabas, head of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology at the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) and chair of the National Sub-Technical Working Group for Childhood Cancer, as she discusses the country's challenges in fighting childhood cancer. She also talks about childhood cancer care at PGH and how the institution leads initiatives to improve care in the country. Produced by Edg Adrian A. Eva Audio editing by Jayson John D. Marinas

Send us a textGet to know Maria Hoegh, ARNP!Maria Hoegh is a board-certified Family Nurse Practitioner. She received her Doctor of Nursing Practice from Creighton University in 2021, and recently moved from Utah where she was practicing in a Family Medicine clinic.Prior to the start of her career as a Nurse Practitioner, Maria's nursing career began in 2013 after graduating with her BSN from Clarkson College. She has worked as a Pediatric Emergency nurse at Blank Children's Hospital, and she also worked at the University of Iowa's Children's Hospital in both the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and Medical Surgical Unit.During this mini-episode, we asked Maria about:Why she chose to become a nurse practitionerWhat she wants her patients to knowHer special interests in medicine Her hobbiesHer family & petsand more! Listen now to this short, fun episode to get to know Maria Hoegh, ARNP.

Episode 11: Addressing Pain in Children CME Link:           https://cmetracker.net/UTHSCSA/Publisher?page=pubOpen#/getCertificate/10098069   FACULTY: Melissa Frei-Jones, MD is a Professor of Pediatrics, Division of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology, Medical Director, South Texas Sickle and Thalassemia Program, UT Health San Antonio, Texas.   OVERVIEW: In this episode of Pediatrics Now, host Holly Wayment brings a Grand Rounds presentation by Dr. Melissa Frei-Jones about the treatment and special challenges of treating pain in children. Dr. Jones discusses understanding the complexities of pain and pain assessments in infant, children, and adolescents, explores pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic methods of pain management, and prescribing opioids in the modern era – navigating pain contracts and the prescription monitoring database. OVERALL LEARNING OBJECTIVE: Increased awareness and education for pediatric providers   DISCLOSURE TO LEARNERS: Melissa Frei-Jones, MD has no financial relationships with ineligible companies to disclose.   The Pediatric Grand Rounds Planning Committee (Deepak Kamat, MD, PhD, Steven Seidner, MD, Daniel Ranch, MD and Elizabeth Hanson, MD) has no financial relationships with ineligible companies to disclose. The UT Health Science Center San Antonio and Deepak Kamat, MD course director and content reviewer for the activity, have reviewed all financial disclosure information for all speakers, facilitators, and planning committee members; and determined and resolved all conflicts of interests. CONTINUING MEDICAL EDUCATION STATEMENTS: The UT Health Science Center San Antonio is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians. The UT Health Science Center San Antonio designates this live activity up to a maximum of 1.00 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™. The presentation, Addressing Pain in Children, has been designated by UT Health Science Center San Antonio for 1 credit of education in pain management and the prescription of opioids. Successful completion of this CME activity, which includes participation in the activity, with individual assessments of the participant and feedback to the participant, enables the participant to earn 1 MOC point in the American Board of Pediatrics' (ABP) Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program. It is the CME activity provider's responsibility to submit participant completion information to ACCME for the purpose of granting ABP MOC credit. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity. CERTIFICATE OF ATTENDANCE: Healthcare professionals will receive a certificate of attendance and are asked to consult with their licensing board for information on applicability and acceptance. Credit may be obtained upon successful completion of the activity's evaluation. RELEASE DATE: 11/15/2024  EXPIRATION DATE: 8/31/2027  

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Eneida Nemecek, a pediatric oncologist specializing in bone marrow transplants and cellular therapies. Dr. Nemecek provides an in-depth look at the science behind these treatments, the process patients go through, and the challenges faced by both patients and caregivers. She emphasizes the importance of caregiver well-being, particularly sleep, and discusses a PCORI study on stress management for caregivers. The episode concludes with a rapid-fire Q&A session covering key terms and concepts in the field. This episode was supported by the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) and features these PCORI studies (Study #1 & Study #2) by Mark Laudenslager, PhD. Key Highlights: 1. Bone marrow transplant involves replacing a patient's immune system with a healthier one, either from a donor or the patient's own modified cells. 2. Caregiver quality of life, especially sleep, is crucial for patient outcomes in bone marrow transplant cases. 3. CAR-T therapy is a form of cellular therapy where white blood cells are engineered to attack specific targets, offering new treatment options for certain cancers. About our guest: Dr. Eneida Nemecek is a Professor of Pediatrics and Medical Oncology and Associate Director of Clinical Research at the Knight Cancer Institute-Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) in Portland, Oregon. Native from Puerto Rico, she completed her Pediatric residency at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, OH and Pediatric Hematology/Oncology fellowship at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington. She has a Master in Epidemiology and Clinical Research from the University of Washington and a Master in Healthcare Business Administration from OHSU. Dr. Nemecek is an established clinical researcher with over 20 years of experience in trials ranging from investigator-initiated early phase to large, multicenter studies funded by a variety of mechanisms.  Her research focuses on bone marrow and cellular therapies, experimental oncology therapeutics and health services research addressing disparities in access for underrepresented groups. She has served in leadership roles in steering committees for several national cooperative research groups.  She has also held elected leadership positions as director, trustee or committee chair in multiple professional organizations. The Your Cancer GPS™ platform is coming! Step-by-step subway maps that guide you through the entire cancer experience. Learn more here!⁠ Key Moments: At 14:40 “Sleep is healthy. If you are the one caregiver of a patient and you get sick because you're stressed and not getting enough rest, then you get affected and your patient gets affected too. It's a very important part of our health. Eat, sleep, get some time for yourself. Those are all things that just need to happen. The way that we're designing medicine today, sometimes we forget that the caregiver is kind of a patient. If we lose that person, we are in serious trouble. I can tell you multiple examples about when that has happened and how difficult it is for the medical team and for the family.” At 28:03 “I think it's really important to remind ourselves that the brain, our psychosocial life, is part of our health. I think sleep, exercise, diet studies, anything that can improve the life of people should be studied in a very organized setting, just like you study drugs, if we're going to do this well.” Disclaimer: All content and information provided in connection with Manta Cares is solely intended for informational and educational purposes only.  This content and information is not intended to be a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.

In this episode, pediatric palliative care nurse practitioner Mallory Fossa, MS, CPNP-PC, CCRN, CHPPN® discusses her experiences in pediatric palliative care with Kathy Perko, MS, PPCNP-BC, CHPPN®, CPON, CPLC, FPCN, FAPHON, a pediatric nurse for 40 years and PNP for 30 years. Together, they discuss the obstacles of managing pain in children, including communication between the patient, caregivers, and palliative care team. Topics discussed include assessment, management of pain including tissue injury, nerve pain, and mixed pain, and the concept of total pain. Related Resources: NEW! Palliative Care Pediatric Pain Basics Publications for Pediatric RNs CHPPN® Prep About the Speakers: Moderator: Kathy Perko, MS, PPCNP-BC, CHPPN®, CPON, CPLC, FPCN, FAPHON Featuring:  Mallory Fossa, MS, CPNP-PC, CCRN, CHPPN® Mallory Fossa, MS, CPNP-PC, CCRN, CHPPN® Mallory Fossa is a pediatric palliative care nurse practitioner practicing at Connecticut Children's. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of Rhode Island, following which she was a pediatric ICU nurse. She received her MSN in pediatric primary care at New York University with a subspecialty certificate in palliative care. After graduation, she worked in Los Angeles at Children's Hospital Los Angeles on the pediatric palliative care team caring for children both in the acute care setting as well as outpatient setting. She is now working at CT Children's on their palliative care team, where in addition to her clinical role she works on QI projects to improve the care provided to pediatric palliative care patients and children in the hospital at end of life. Additionally, she serves on the AAHPM Pediatric State of the Science workgroup. Kathy Perko, MS, PPCNP-BC, CHPPN®, CPON, CPLC, FPCN, FAPHON Kathy Perko has been a pediatric nurse for 40 years, a PNP for 30 years. She started her career in pediatric oncology, specifically caring for children with brain tumors which she continued through 2015. She founded the Bridges Pediatric Palliative Care Program at OHSU Doernbecher Children's Hospital in 2003 and was the director until her retirement in November 2020. Kathy helped develop the Pediatric Track of the UW Palliative Care Certificate Program and directed the track until 2024.  She provides education and consultation in pediatric palliative care through PANDA Consultants, PLLC  She is nationally certified as a pediatric nurse practitioner, pediatric oncology nurse, perinatal loss clinician and pediatric palliative care and hospice nurse.  She is recognized as a Fellow in Palliative and Hospice Care and in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology.  She is national faculty for ELNEC, EPEC, and Vital Talk. Kathy has a certificate in pediatric bioethics from Children's Mercy in Kansas City and in Palliative Care from the University of Washington. 

Rachel Offenbacher, MD is a Pediatric Hematologist/Oncologist at the Children's Hospital at Montefiore (CHAM). She received her Medical Degree from SUNY Downstate after completing the Sophie Davis School of Biomedical Education (a 7 year BS/MD program at CUNY). She completed her residency and fellowship at CHAM and is an Assistanr Professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. In addition to seeing patients clinically, she is a member of a translational sarcoma research lab where she is investigating difluoromethylornithine (DFMO) on Ewing sarcoma and osteosarcoma. Dr. Offenbacher recently received funding from Hyundai Hope on Wheels to continue this work with the plan to move it into a phase II clinical trial. She lives in Manhattan with her husband, also a physician, and their three children. __________________________________________________ This episode is dedicated in memory of Dr. Rachel Offenbacher's mother, Devorah bas Chaim. May her memory be a blessing. __________________________________________________ Rena Goldberg is a second year medical student at Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine. She attended Stern College for Women where she majored in Biology and minored in Chemistry. She has been involved in JOWMA since she was a pre-med, and is a co-host of the specialty spotlight podcast. __________________________________________________ This week's episode is sponsored by Toveedo! The Jewish videos your kids love, all in one happy place. https://toveedo.com/ __________________________________________________ • Sponsor the JOWMA Podcast! Email digitalcontent@jowma.org • Become a JOWMA Member! www.jowma.org  • Follow us on Instagram! www.instagram.com/JOWMA_org  • Follow us on Twitter!www.twitter.com/JOWMA_med  • Follow us on Facebook! https://www.facebook.com/JOWMAorg • Stay up-to-date with JOWMA news! Sign up for the JOWMA newsletter! https://jowma.us6.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=9b4e9beb287874f9dc7f80289&id=ea3ef44644&mc_cid=dfb442d2a7&mc_eid=e9eee6e41e

In this episode, I discuss trauma and how to deal with its impact with Dr. Norman Fried. After October 7th, Dr. Fried became a vocal advocate and dealt with the backlash. This is an extremely deep episode and one of my personal favorites. After receiving his PhD in clinical and pediatric psychology from Emory University, Dr. Norman J. Fried served as the chief psychologist for the Children's Cancer Centers and the Division of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Northwell Health and Winthrop University Hospitals for 20 years. His academic appointments include assistant professor in pediatrics and psychiatry at New York University Medical School, adjunct assistant professor of pastoral counseling at the Jewish Theological Seminary/Columbia University, and fellow in clinical and pediatric psychology at Harvard Medical School. Now in full-time private practice as a grief and trauma specialist, Norman lectures on the practice of psychotherapy with critically and terminally ill children and their families at conferences across the US and Europe. Additionally, he is a disaster mental health specialist for the American Red Cross of greater New York. He is the author of four books, including The Childhood Trauma Recovery Workbook for Adults. Additionally, he is a regular contributor on crisis intervention and recovery for television and news shows, including Dr. Phil, Fox News, BBC World News, NBC News, and the Bravo channel.EndoDNA: The breakthrough DNA test that matches you with the right cannabinoid products for your wellness journey. Endo·dna gives you two guaranteed ways to uncover your unique endocompatibility today. Click here to check out which product is right for you.   Connect with EndoDNA on SOCIAL: IG | X | YOUTUBE | FB Connect with host, Len May, on IG    

About our guest … Dr. Lasky joined the Cure the Kids Foundation in 2017. He attended medical school at the University of Illinois in Chicago and did his pediatric residency at the University of Chicago. He completed his Pediatric Hematology Oncology fellowship at UCLA in 2006 and was director of the Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Program at UCLA until 2009 when he moved to Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance, CA, and was named Chief of the Division of Pediatric Hematology Oncology. While there, Dr. Lasky became involved with a number of clinical trials for patients with bleeding disorders (including hemophilia and von Willebrand disease) as well as sickle cell anemia. While continuing to have research interests in pediatric brain tumors and immunology, he also is interested in running and developing clinical trials for patients with bleeding disorders and sickle cell anemia. Dr. Lasky is a member of several professional societies including the Children's Oncology Group, Society for Neuro-Oncology, the American Society of Hematology, and the American Academy of Pediatrics. He enjoys watching sports, reading, music, and outdoor activities with his family. In September of 2022, Dr. Lasky is now the Medical Director at Cure 4 The Kids (C4K).

Kristen VanHeyst, DO from UH Rainbows Babies and Children's Hospital discusses and shares updates regarding a Phase I/II multi-centered, multi-continental trial, to assess the safety and efficacy of Vactosertib in adolescents and adults with recurrent, refractory or progressive osteosarcoma.Dr. Kristen VanHeyst is a pediatric hematologist/oncologist and a translational therapeutics-oriented physician scientist. She completed her clinical fellowship in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology in 2019 and was appointed Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine at that time. She has been a member of the Alex Huang, MD, PhD laboratory since 2017. Dr. VanHeyst has focused her research efforts on understanding the role of the tumor microenvironment in osteosarcoma and how immunotherapy could be a novel therapeutic option for patients with this disease. Additionally, she is the Principal Investigator of a Phase I/II investigator initiated clinical trial at University Hospitals Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital. She is also the Principal Investigator of a Phase I/II multi-centered, multi-continental clinical trial designed in collaboration with MedPacto, Inc for patients with relapsed/refractory osteosarcoma.  For these efforts, she was the recipient of an NIH K12 award as well as multiple foundation awards from Hyundai Hope on Wheels, MIB Agents, CureSearch and CURE Childhood Cancer. She is currently a member of the Children's Oncology Group Bone Tumor Committee.LMAdd a comment

Nilay Shah, MD is a clinician-scientist and Associate Professor in the Division of Hematology/Oncology/BMT at Nationwide Children's Hospital. His primary clinical focus is on pediatric solid tumors, including neuroblastomas, tumors of the kidneys, and rare solid tumors of childhood. His research focuses on the molecular drivers of pediatric cancers and how new treatment approaches can be taken to better target those drivers. In this role, he works to identify new uses of currently available anticancer treatments, including drugs originally developed for use against cancers in adults.  He serves as Associate Director for Liver Tumor, Kidney Tumor, Germ Cell, and Neuroblastoma Targeted Therapies, and is currently the Sponsor and Study Principal Investigator the CaboMain trial, a Phase 2 study evaluating the efficacy of the oral anticancer agent cabozantinib as a maintenance therapy for ultra-high-risk solid tumors.He also serves as co-director of the Cancer Genetics Program. This program serves to advance the use of genetic and genomic evaluations for the benefits of patients. In this role, he sees patients in the Cancer Predisposition Clinic for evaluation, surveillance, and management of patients with genetic alterations that predispose to cancer development. He also consults on patients for precision oncology, partnering with the Institute for Genomic Medicine to identify therapeutic approaches based on patient tumor and germline genomics.Dr. Shah is a graduate of the Honors Program in Medical Education at Northwestern University, earning his medical degree in 2003. Dr. Shah completed a residency in General Pediatrics in 2006 at the Children's Hospital of Wisconsin, and a fellowship in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Johns Hopkins University and the National Cancer Institute in 2011. He also was a Research Instructor at the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., prior to his arrival at Nationwide Children's Hospital in 2013.

Rachel Offenbacher, MD, is an attending physician at Children's Hospital at Montefiore (CHAM) and Assistant Professor, Pediatric Hematology, Oncology, Marrow and Blood Cell Transplantation at Montefiore Einstein. She joins us on OsteoBites to share her work on targeting urea cycle dysfunction to prevent and treat osteosarcoma metastasis.Since joining the Montefiore team, Dr. Offenbacher's clinical focus has been pediatric sarcomas. As a member of a translational sarcoma research lab, Dr. Offenbacher is fascinated by the ability to explore the biological processes behind novel therapeutic approaches before they are used in the clinic. Her research focuses on utilizing difluoromethylornithine to prevent and treat metastatic osteosarcoma. She has seen impressive results in her in vitro and in vivo models and is working to initiate a clinical trial. She is simultaneously working on a project funded by the American Association of Cancer Research, Targeting the Tumor Microenvironment of Metastasis to Treat Metastatic Ewing Sarcoma, which is demonstrating promising results. Dr. Offenbacher's work has been published in numerous peer-reviewed journals and presented nationally and internationally. Dr. Offenbacher is board certified in General Pediatrics by the American Board of Pediatrics. She is a member of several professional organizations, including the American Association for Cancer Research, the Children's Oncology Group and the American Society of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology. Dr. Offenbacher is also an active member of the National Pediatric Cancer Foundation. In 2020 and 2022, she won the Leo M. Davidoff Society Teaching Award; in 2022, she won the Pediatric Research Day Oral Presentation Award from CHAM. Dr. Offenbacher is a volunteer pediatric oncologist at Camp Simcha, a residential camp for children with cancer.

Jennifer Mack, MD, MPH from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute/Boston Children's and Harvard Medical School join us on OsteoBites to discuss best practices for engaging patients in research and clinical trials. Dr. Mack is also part of the PE-CGS Network (Participant Engagement and Cancer Genome Sequencing) Count Me In Research Center team and she will be discussing reasons that patients may or may not want to participate in research, ways to engage patients in designing and carrying out trials., and Count Me In as one model for engaging patients.Dr. Mack received her medical degree from Harvard Medical School in 1998. She subsequently completed her residency in Pediatrics and her fellowship in Pediatric Hematology Oncology at Boston Children's Hospital and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, MA. In 2005, Dr. Mack received a Master's Degree in Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health. She is an attending physician at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Boston Children's Hospital, Director of the Center for Outcomes and Policy Research at Dana-Farber, Associate Chief of the Division of Population Sciences at Dana-Farber, Associate Chief for Pediatric Oncology Population Sciences at Dana-Farber/Boston Children's, and Faculty Vice President for the Office for Faculty Development, Professionalism, and Inclusion at Dana-Farber. She is also an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. Her research interests are in parent-clinician and patient-clinician communication, health care equity and quality, and palliative care.

Debra L. Friedman, M.D., is a professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Hematology and Oncology at the Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt. She is the E. Bronson Ingram Chair of Pediatric Oncology and the leader of the Cancer Control and Prevention Program and directs the Cancer Survivorship programs at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center. Dr. Friedman's research interests lie in the long term outcomes for cancer survivors, as well as in the design of novel therapeutic protocols for childhood cancer, designed to decrease adverse long-term effects of therapy. She has leadership roles in Children's Oncology Group (COG) and is an internationally recognized expert in cancer survivorship, participating in projects evaluating best practices and models of care. She is investigating a diverse group of physiologic and psychosocial outcomes among survivors of pediatric cancer, hematopoietic stem cell transplant and medical oncology. Friedman completed her pediatric residency and a joint fellowship in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and Cancer Epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania and The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). Prior to coming to Vanderbilt in 2008, she served as the co-director of the Cancer Survivorship Program at CHOP and then, as the founder and director of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center Survivorship Program. ---- What We Do at MIB Agents: PROGRAMS: End-of-Life MISSIONS Gamer Agents Agent Writers Prayer Agents Healing Hearts - Bereaved Parent and Sibling Support Ambassador Agents - Peer Support Warrior Mail Young Adult Survivorship Support Group EDUCATION for physicians, researchers and families: OsteoBites, weekly webinar & podcast with thought leaders and innovators in Osteosarcoma MIB Book: Osteosarcoma: From our Families to Yours RESEARCH: Annual MIB FACTOR Research Conference Funding multiple $100,000 and $50,000 grants annually for OS research MIB Testing & Research Directory The Osteosarcoma Project partner with Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard ... Kids are still dying with 40+ year old treatments. Help us MakeItBetter. https://www.mibagents.org​ Help support MIB Agents, Donate here https://give-usa.keela.co/embed/YAipuSaWxHPJP7RCJ SUBSCRIBE for all the Osteosarcoma Intel

Dr. Stephanie Massaro, Medical Director, Pediatric Hematology/Oncology, at Yale New Haven Children's Hospital has started a new initiative to help children with illnesses- and needs your help to continue to grow it!

This PedsCases podcast is an overview on approach to neonatal thrombocytopenia. It was made by Justin Park, a medical student at the University of British Columbia in collaboration with Dr. Aisha Bruce, associate professor in the Division of Pediatric Hematology & Oncology at the University of Alberta.

This week, we talk to Anne Tseng. With Jeff Fuhrman, she's one of two New Canaan residents who serve on the board of Make-A-Wish Connecticut and next Tuesday, they'll sit on a panel at New Canaan Library to talk about the organization's work in making life-changing wishes come true for children with critical illnesses, along with local Make-A-Wish parents and Dr. Stephanie Massaro, Medical Director of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Yale-New Haven Children's Hospital and Make-A-Wish CT Chapter Medical Advisor. I will be moderating the panel, to be held 5 to 7 p.m. on Oct. 24 in the Jim & Dede Bartlett Auditorium at New Canaan Library.

The longest running community podcast in America, Drew Schlosberg's Spotlight On The Community on the Cloudcast Media network, sponsored by Mission Federal Credit Union, was "live" at the 21st Annual LEAD San Diego Visionary Awards. Enjoy the excellent conversation between Charles Parisi, the CEO of Cloudcast Media and Erin Tanner, Executive Producer, Cloudcast Media (filling in for Drew Schlosberg), and two Visionary Award Winners, Dr. William Roberts, the Division Chief, Pediatric Hematology / Oncology at Rady Children's Hospital, and Dr. Paula Aristizabal, Pediatric Oncologist and the Director of International Outreach, for Rady Children's Hospital. For more information on LEAD San Diego, please visit https://sdchamber.org/lead/For more information on Cloudcast Media, please visit www.cloudcastmedia.usFor more information on Mission Fed, please visit www.missionfed.com.

Matteo Trucco, MD and Kurt Weiss, MD joins us on OsteoBites to describe the collaboration that led to the current Phase 1 clinical trial repurposing the alcoholism drug disulfiram to see if it can overcome the chemotherapy resistance seen in relapsed sarcomas, including osteosarcoma. Matteo Trucco is a Pediatric Oncologist and the Clinical Director of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Cleveland Clinic Children's, specializing in the care of children, teenagers and young adults battling bone and soft tissue cancers. He also directs the Children's Cancer Innovative Therapy Program where he and colleagues design, develop and conduct clinical trials seeking more effective and less toxic treatments for childhood cancers. Dr. Trucco earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Pennsylvania and Medical Degree from Temple University School of Medicine. He completed his Pediatrics Residency at Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital and his Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Fellowship from Johns Hopkins and the National Cancer Institute. In addition to his roles at the Cleveland Clinic, he is a Co-chair of the National Pediatric Cancer Foundation's Sunshine Project consortium, partnering with other top pediatric cancer centers to develop clinical trials. He is honored to be on the Board of MIB Agents, chairs its Scientific Advisory Board and co-chairs the organizing committee for the FACTOR Conference. He also has the privilege of moderating the MIB Agents TURBO Tumor Review Board for Osteosarcoma. Dr. Weiss directs the Department's Musculoskeletal Oncology Laboratory, a basic science laboratory dedicated to the study of sarcomas. His mission is to help develop a world-class translational sarcoma research program at the University of Pittsburgh. As a bone cancer survivor himself, Dr. Weiss brings passion and enthusiasm to the laboratory, clinic, and operating room. Through the UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, he is also a proud collaborator with scientists who are trying to understand how other forms of cancer spread to and destroy the bone. Dr. Weiss is a Founding Member of the Musculoskeletal Oncology Research Initiative (MORI), Pittsburgh Cure Sarcoma (PCS), the Pittsburgh Sarcoma Research Collaborative (PSaRC), and the Pittsburgh Center for Bone and Mineral Research (PCBMR). He is a peer reviewer for multiple journals including the Journal of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, BioMed Central Cancer, Sarcoma, Cancer Research, International Journal of Cancer, and others. He is a former member of the NIH's Center for Scientific Review Early Career Reviewer program. He has served on multiple National Cancer Institute Study Sections. He is a member of the Musculoskeletal Tumor Society (MSTS) for which he serves as Chair of the Research Committee and the Connective Tissue Oncology Society (CTOS), for which he has served on the Board of Directors. ----- What We Do at MIB Agents: PROGRAMS: End-of-Life MISSIONS Gamer Agents Agent Writers Prayer Agents Healing Hearts - Bereaved Parent and Sibling Support Ambassador Agents - Peer Support Warrior Mail Young Adult Survivorship Support Group EDUCATION for physicians, researchers and families: OsteoBites, weekly webinar & podcast with thought leaders and innovators in Osteosarcoma MIB Book: Osteosarcoma: From our Families to Yours RESEARCH: Annual MIB FACTOR Research Conference Funding multiple $100,000 and $50,000 grants annually for OS research MIB Testing & Research Directory The Osteosarcoma Project partner with Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard ... Kids are still dying with 40+ year old treatments. Help us MakeItBetter. https://www.mibagents.org​ Help support MIB Agents, Donate here https://give-usa.keela.co/embed/YAipuSaWxHPJP7RCJ SUBSCRIBE for all the Osteosarcoma Intel

A variety of perspectives are explored as Dr. Westin speaks with Dr. Jennifer Mack, Dr. Chun Chao, and Mallory Casperson about end-of-life care planning in adolescent and young adult cancer. TRANSCRIPT The guest on this podcast episode has no disclosures to declare.  Dr. Shannon Westin: Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of JCO After Hours, the podcast where we get down and dirty with manuscripts that are being published in the Journal Clinical Oncology. And I am your host, Shannon Westin, GYN Oncologist and Social Media Editor of the Journal of Clinical Oncology. I am so very excited to have a number of guests with us today to discuss a very important paper entitled “Discussions About Goals of Care and Advanced Care Planning Among Adolescents and Young Adults with Cancer Approaching the End of Life.”  And I'm joined by several of the authors of this important paper. The first is Dr. Jennifer Mack. She is the Associate Chief in the Division of Population Sciences, an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School and Senior Physician in Pediatric Hematology Oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Welcome, Dr. Mack. Dr. Jennifer Mack: Thank you. Dr. Shannon Westin: We also have Mallory Casperson. She is the cofounder and CEO of the Cactus Cancer Society. They provide online support programs and resources to young adult cancer survivors and caregivers in the comfort of their own homes. Welcome.   Mallory Casperson: Thanks for having me. Dr. Shannon Westin: And then, finally, last but not least, Dr. Chun Chao. She is a Senior Research Scientist in the Division of Epidemiologic Research in the Department of Research and Evaluation at Kaiser Permanente Southern California. Welcome.  Dr. Chun Chao: Thank you. It's a pleasure being here. Dr. Shannon Westin: So I want to get right into this. I think that there certainly has been a lot of discussion, at least at our institution as well as at the ASCO level, around advanced care planning across all patients with cancer and anyone with a diagnosis of cancer. And I would love to just start and level set and make sure all of our listeners are all on the same baseline around the incidence and prevalence of cancer in adolescents and young adults. Like, first, define what are the age groups that we're looking at here? How common is cancer in this population? Dr. Jennifer Mack: Right. For this study, we defined adolescents and young adults as individuals aged 12 to 39. And right now, about 90,000 adolescents and young adults are diagnosed with cancer in the United States each year. Those numbers are also rising, so more and more are diagnosed each year, and because of that, we think it's increasingly important to pay attention to the needs of this population. This population really experiences a whole range of different cancer types, some of which are more common in children, some of which are more common in adults, but the most common ones include breast and gastrointestinal cancers, sarcomas, germ cell tumors, leukemias, lymphomas, and brain tumors. Dr. Shannon Westin: And your manuscript notes that adolescents and young adults seem to receive medically intensive measures at the end of life. Now, how common is this across this group? And do you all have a sense of some of the reasons that we see this increased use of these measures? Dr. Jennifer Mack: That's a great question. We and others—actually, the early work that led to this study was done with Chun. We had previously found that most adolescents and young adults receive at least some kind of medically intensive care at the end of life. And that includes things like being hospitalized, being in the intensive care unit, receiving chemotherapy, and spending time in the emergency room near the end of life. And so, if you take all of those together, about two-thirds of adolescents and young adults receive at least one of these near the end of life.  And we don't know the reasons for this. There are probably complex reasons. Some adolescents and young adults may actually want to receive these kinds of measures, maybe because they're young and they want to do everything they can to live as long as they can. And some patients in this age group are parents to young children, and they may be making choices to prolong life and be there for their kids. But we also know that if we look at older adults, most people who know they're dying don't want to receive this type of care, which is also associated with more suffering and with poorer quality of life. So it's also possible they're making these choices because they don't fully recognize they're approaching the end of life or because they haven't had opportunity to plan for this time through conversations with their medical teams. Mallory Casperson: I think the conjecture, too, that a young adult is likely to focus on extending life, even in a situation where palliation is the stated goal, is a really great conjecture. This population is really burdened by these unique psychosocial issues that are driven by the extreme disruptions that cancer has on major life milestones. Like Jenny said, they may have young children at home, they may have a new spouse at home, still be trying to advance at work, you name it. So this period of young adulthood is really characterized by constant change. And it's possible that these young adults are being driven to stay present in their lives for really as long as possible to reach some of these goals or even just to support their young families as they reach their own goals. Dr. Shannon Westin: I really appreciate that context, and I'm going to always bring it back to what I know as a provider of gynecologic cancer care, where we see quite a bit of young people at the beginning of their life, at the beginning of their fertility. And I think it is so important to keep that context in mind as we're designing interventions and studies and things like that. So I really appreciate that, having the ability to kind of see from that standpoint. So I think you guys have convinced me this is important. We know the reasons. So why don't we just lay out the objectives of this particular study and give our listeners a brief review of how it was designed? Dr. Jennifer Mack: Great. We wanted to know how often adolescent and young adult patients with incurable cancer have discussions about prognosis and end-of-life care planning before they die. And a secondary goal was to understand whether having earlier discussions would change the type of care that's delivered. So, for example, having those discussions about goals of care earlier in their illness, could that make them less likely to receive intensive measures?  So, to do the study, we conducted a retrospective review of health records for nearly 2,000 adolescents and young adults who died between 2005 and 2019 after receiving care in one of three centers—the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Kaiser Permanente Southern California, Kaiser Permanente Northern California—and looked for documentation of discussions about care planning. For this study, we focused on patients who either had stage IV disease at diagnosis or who had experienced a recurrence because we wanted to ensure that we had a population of young people who were living with advanced disease and not people who might have died suddenly and unexpectedly during treatment, because they might not have had the same opportunity for end-of-life care planning. So we really wanted to focus on those who had the poorest prognoses. Dr. Shannon Westin: It's a really large group of people and, I think, hopefully fairly representative. I guess my question is, when you're looking at the group that you were able to kind of pull from in this retrospective database, which I think can sometimes be limited, do you feel like it was fairly representative of the population that's out kind of across the States, let's say? Dr. Chun Chao: So I think it's a real strength that we included two different care settings in this study, so a tertiary cancer center and community-based cancer care. Therefore, patients who seek care in each of these settings are representative in our study. I think this design really increased the generalizability of our findings. And on a further note, in this study, we actually observed very similar care patterns across all three study settings. So that was quite reassuring. Dr. Shannon Westin: So reassuring. And I think it brings up a point that I wanted to make, and I also agree was a strength of your study, is having that across the academic center and then a large integrated health plan. And I guess I'm just curious how your collaboration came to be to kind of come across different groups and, of course, the inclusion of Mallory from the patient advocate side. I think this is a testament to your powers of collaboration. I'd just be interested in how that kind of came to be. Dr. Chun Chao: So this goes back to almost 10 years ago. I think, at that time, people started to really recognize that adolescent and young adults with cancer were a very understudied group, but they are also very challenging to study. So, for example, AYA cancers, adolescent and young adult cancers, are fortunately not very common. Although the number is increasing, you do need a large population base to study them. So, at that time, researchers at Integrated Health Systems started to really see that we had an opportunity here to really contribute to this knowledge gap, leveraging the resources that we had at these health systems, especially the ones that have a very large membership and a long-term retention of these members and also a comprehensive electronic medical record system.  At that time, my colleague and I published a study that demonstrated the feasibility of using these resources to do follow-up studies of long-term health outcomes of AYAs with cancer. And I think that we might have attracted people's attention to utilizing the resources at these health systems to do such studies. So Jenny was the one who really saw the need or the lack of data or the need of high-quality data to really improve care for our AYAs who are at that end-of-life stage. So she reached out to a research network called the Cancer Research Network, who I think that the people there connected Jenny with me because I was also starting to work on long-term health outcomes of AYA cancer survivors, adolescent and young adults. After we talked, we were like, “We have to get this funded. We have to get these questions answered. These questions are so important.” So, as Jenny mentioned, we did a pilot study that really showed there is a lot of burden of medical intensive care at the end of life for our young patients. And, as often is true with research, this opens up a lot more additional questions that we needed answers for. So we have been working together since then.  Mallory Casperson: I came into this group sort of by accident. My background is in engineering. I was about halfway through a PhD when I needed to leave a couple years outside of my first cancer diagnosis. And I was at ASCO staffing a booth for my organization and just happened to meet a researcher from Kaiser Permanente Northern California, and the rest is history. That introduction sort of got me into this world, and, once you know one person, you get to meet others. And it's just been a really, really wonderful opportunity to help, I think, insert the patient voice. But also, for me, I just love research and data. And so getting to help advance the conversations happening around adolescent and young adult care in this research setting and in these settings where we are getting to look at very large datasets has just been really, really wonderful. Dr. Shannon Westin: These are my favorite parts of these podcasts, these stories of how things kind of came to be. And, at the risk of taking too much time there, I love the story, and I'm so in awe of you guys.  I guess, let's get to the bottom line. What did you guys find? Did you find what you expected in regards to advanced care planning and goals of care in this population? Dr. Jennifer Mack: So we felt that most patients had documented discussions about prognosis, about goals of care, about palliative care, hospice, and their preferred location of death before they died. Dr. Shannon Westin: So I was actually kind of impressed at that. It seemed like a lot. I was expecting—I don't know what I was expecting, but I think I was expecting less documented discussions because, in my own practice, I don't necessarily think I do a great job of this. So was that in line? Were you expecting to see such kind of high levels of documentation? Dr. Jennifer Mack: I really agree with you. I was impressed with the fact that most patients had these discussions. Many of them had more than one discussion about their goals of care. So their providers were going back and having follow-up discussions, making sure that their goals of care were the same and weren't changing over time. So I agree. I was pleasantly surprised with how often these were happening.   I would say I'd love to see these discussions either happening with everyone or at least offered to all patients so that they can say whether they want to have them or not. So, in this study, 17% of patients never had a discussion about goals of care. And non-white and Hispanic patients had lower rates of discussions than white patients. So there are some potentially important gaps here that need attention. But I also think you're right; there's a lot of good news here. Clinicians are making consistent efforts to talk with patients about their wishes for care, and then they're documenting them, which is an important thing because it allows those wishes to be known by everybody on the care team and helps to ensure that they're going to be carried out. Dr. Shannon Westin: I was also intrigued by the finding of the younger patients having earlier discussions around advanced care planning and hospice and goals of care. Any thoughts as to why that might be? Again, I felt like it was a little bit opposite of what I was expecting, not having a ton of background in the area.  Dr. Jennifer Mack: I was surprised, too. We had to check the numbers a couple of times just to be sure because it wasn't what I was expecting. And we don't know for sure what the reason for this is, but I think one possibility is that some of these discussions with the youngest patients, or for the youngest patients, are happening with family members, maybe their parents. And it's possible that clinicians are a little more comfortable or more likely to talk with parents than with the young patients themselves. And so that could actually increase rates of discussions for that group.  One thing we didn't assess was who was there for the discussions. It's not always documented. There's more to learn there about who was there and more about what was discussed. But that was our guess is that these may be family discussions more so than patient discussions. Dr. Shannon Westin: That really makes a lot of sense. And then I guess the next natural question is when we have these earlier goals-of-care discussions or when we have these discussions at all, what did you guys see on the impact of those kind of medical interventions that happened after? Dr. Jennifer Mack: Yeah. We found that when goals-of-care discussions happened earlier, more than a month before death, that adolescents and young adults were less likely to receive some of these intensive measures that we've talked about, so less likely to receive late-life chemotherapy, care in the intensive care unit and emergency room, and less likely to be hospitalized in the last month of life. So, even though these findings were observational, it creates the potential that having discussions earlier can help reduce some of these intensive measures and refocus care on palliation, if that's what patients are looking for. Dr. Shannon Westin: I think that's a really important point because we often bring our own thoughts and beliefs into the care of our patients and think, “Well, I wouldn't want those things.” And I think making sure we know where the patient is—and Mallory, I'd just be interested to get your thoughts here. How do we best approach those things and try to avoid—you know, we want to give advice where advice is needed, and we want to make it clear what the goals or what the potential successes might be. But I'd be really interested to hear your thoughts around framing those discussions and making sure that people understand what can be gained from those types of intensive treatments. Mallory Casperson: Yeah. I think it's important with patients in this situation—and it was discussed in the paper, but the idea of timing, how frequently are we having these care preference types of conversations, and how often are we reframing things with the patient based on how goals might be changing? I think that's a huge piece of the equation because, especially when we're talking about 30 days before death, 60 days before death, things might change quite rapidly from week to week and so having some of those things in mind.  And then it wasn't discussed as much on this paper, but it definitely has been in other work by both of these authors, as well as other just end-of-life research, but this idea of who is in the room for these conversations, I think, is another really important piece of this. Because a caregiver might have different preferences and goals than a patient. If a patient is 15 versus a patient is 25 versus a patient is 39 is also going to change things, and it's going to change the perspective that their caregivers bring to the equation. And so I think who is in the room and how are we doing that very difficult thing of weighing people's opinions in the situation, I think, is very complicated and also very important to figure out. Dr. Shannon Westin: And I think that that leads to my next question: How do we get more of that information? What do you think are the next steps for this particular work? And also, I would just say, how do we guide that? I mean, I struggle with these conversations. It doesn't matter if my patient is 22 or 82. I think trying to meet people where they are is one of the critical pieces. So what's next for this work? How do we help inform these discussions for the caregivers and for their providers? Dr. Jennifer Mack: I think you're right that we do think an important next step is promoting earlier discussions about goals of care and advanced care planning, partly because it gives patients time to reflect on what's important to them, to digest the news, and then make thoughtful decisions that are best for them. But from a research perspective, I think, as we do that, we need to understand more deeply what adolescents and young adults want from these conversations. What topics should be addressed, with whom, and how should they be discussed? And we've also learned from other work, including work that the three of us have done together, that goals of care for adolescents and young adults aren't always as simple as wanting care focused on palliation or prolonging life, this kind of binary thing. Often, there are these other equally important goals, like making sure their loved ones are okay, what's going to help them the most, having opportunities to nurture and deepen their relationships, and finding ways to attain their life goals and meaning while they're living with advanced disease.  So all of these different aspects, which aren't always a typical part of goals-of-care conversations, could be integrated to help support the kind of wider goals that are held by adolescents and young adults with cancer.   Mallory Casperson: I think, too, adding to that, we've talked about how AYA patients' goals of care have changed over time. So I think timing is a thing that could be added into future work, which is a difficult thing, I think, to gather from some of these records sometimes. But also, I think thinking through what these different words mean to different populations and how we're defining them is really important, too. So just an example outside of end-of-life care: When you tell a 30-year-old who's going through cancer that exercise is important during treatment and you talk to a 70-year-old going through cancer that exercise is different, that means different things, and they themselves have different context around what that word means in their normal life. And so I think when we throw out words like “palliation,” “palliative care,” and just general end-of-life conversations, that the same context applies. When an AYA agrees that maybe palliative care is the goal, what does that mean to them, and what are they bringing to the conversation in terms of their younger perspective than an older population that we're potentially more used to working with? So I think framing these ideas and how they might differ between populations is another thing that would serve as future work in this AYA end-of-life care space. Dr. Shannon Westin: Great. Well, thank you all so much. The time just flew by. This was such a great discussion of an incredible topic, and I just want to thank you all again for your hard work in this space.   And thank you to all of our listeners. Again, we were discussing the manuscript “Discussions About Goals of Care and Advanced Care Planning Among Adolescents and Young Adults With Cancer Approaching the End of Life.” And this is published in the JCO, so go check it out. And please do go check out our other podcast offerings and tell us what you think on Twitter. We'll see you next time. The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. This is not a substitute for professional medical care and is not intended for use in the diagnosis or treatment of individual conditions. Guests on this podcast express their own opinions, experience, and conclusions. Guest statements on the podcast do not express the opinions of ASCO. The mention of any product, service, organization, activity, or therapy should not be construed as an ASCO endorsement.

Episode 36 CME Link:        https://cmetracker.net/UTHSCSA/Publisher?page=pubOpen#/getCertificate/10094174 www.pediatrisnowpodcast.com Bone Tumors: What to Know as a Pediatrician FACULTY: Cristabel Torres, MD, FAAP moved to San Antonio from Puerto Rico in 2020 (in the middle of COVID pandemic) to start fellowship in Pediatric Hematology-Oncology at UT Health San Antonio and she is currently a third-year fellow and will be completing her fellowship soon. She always had passion for pediatric oncology, as her older brother is a childhood cancer survivor.   OVERVIEW: Pediatrics Now Host and Producer Holly Wayment brings us the grand rounds talk by Dr. Christabel Torres about bone tumors and what you need to know as a pediatrician.  Dr. Torres is passionate about pediatric oncology.  Her brother is a pediatric cancer survivor.   DISCLOSURES: Cristabel Torres, MD, FAAP  has no financial relationships with ineligible companies to disclose.   The Pediatric Grand Rounds Planning Committee (Deepak Kamat, MD, PhD, Daniel Ranch, MD and Elizabeth Hanson, MD) has no financial relationships with ineligible companies to disclose.  Planning Committee member Steven Seidner, MD has disclosed he receives funding from Draeger Medical for the Clinical Study to Evaluate the Safety and Effectiveness of the Infinity Acute Care System Workstation Neonatal Care Babylog VN500 Device in High-Frequency Oscillatory Ventilation (HFOV) Mode in Extremely Low Birth Weight (ELBW) Neonates for which he is a co-principal investigator. The relevant financial relationships noted for Dr. Seidner have been mitigated.     The UT Health Science Center San Antonio and Deepak Kamat, MD course director and content reviewer for the activity, have reviewed all financial disclosure information for all speakers, facilitators, and planning committee members; and determined and resolved all conflicts of interests.   CONTINUING MEDICAL EDUCATION STATEMENTS: The UT Health Science Center San Antonio is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians.   The UT Health Science Center San Antonio designates this live activity up to a maximum of 1.00 AMAPRA Category 1 Credits™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.   CREDITS: AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™ (1.00) Non-Physician Participation Credit (1.00)    

Hosts Chris Joyce and Stephanie Winn sit down with Dr. Marcio Malogolowkin from the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center to discuss fertility preservation for cancer patients.  Dr. Malogolowkin is the Chief of the Division of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology for the Cancer Center. To learn more about the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center, visit https://health.ucdavis.edu/cancer.

Dr. Katie Janeway, a pediatric hematologist-oncologist of Dana Farber/Boston's Children Hospital, and Benjamin Zola, a Project Manager at Count Me In (CMI), will be joining to share more insight into Count Me In's patient- powered Osteosarcoma research project, and the potential outcomes for discoveries that can have a direct impact on the future osteosarcoma.  Count Me In (CMI) is a nonprofit research initiative on a mission to make every patient's experience count in the effort to understand and overcome cancer. Founded in 2018 by Emerson Collective,  Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Count Me In engages patients and enables them to accelerate cancer research by sharing their samples, clinical information, and voices. From their contributions, Count Me In analyzes and shares de-identified data freely to catalyze discoveries across cancer. Data generated by Count Me In is shared regularly via scientific platforms so that it can be harnessed by researchers everywhere to make impactful discoveries. All individuals living with cancer, including those from marginalized communities who have historically been excluded from research, no matter where they live, can contribute to breakthroughs and increase the pace of biomedical research. -- Dr. Katie Janeway received her medical degree from Harvard Medical School in 2000. She subsequently completed her residency in Pediatrics at Children's Hospital, Boston. She was a Chief Resident at Children's Hospital, Boston, and then completed her fellowship in Pediatric Hematology-Oncology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute / Children's Hospital, Boston. In 2007, Dr. Janeway joined the staff of Dana-Farber and Children's Hospital, Boston, where she is a pediatric hematologist-oncologist and investigator with a research focus of pediatric sarcomas. Ben Zola (he/him) is a Project Manager with Count Me In, a nonprofit research initiative that enables patients to accelerate cancer research by sharing their samples, their clinical information, and their voices. Ben has been with the team for over 2 years, and specifically manages Count Me In's projects in Osteosarcoma (osproject.org) and Leiomyosarcoma (lmsproject.org). Ben has a Bachelors Degree from Rutgers University in Biomedical Engineering, with a minor in Psychology. In his free time, Ben is a fitness instructor and also enjoys being outside and taking pictures of nature. ---- What We Do at MIB Agents: PROGRAMS: End-of-Life MISSIONS Gamer Agents Agent Writers Prayer Agents Healing Hearts - Bereaved Parent and Sibling Support Ambassador Agents - Peer Support Warrior Mail Young Adult Survivorship Support Group EDUCATION for physicians, researchers and families: OsteoBites, weekly webinar & podcast with thought leaders and innovators in Osteosarcoma MIB Book: Osteosarcoma: From our Families to Yours RESEARCH: Annual MIB FACTOR Research Conference Funding multiple $100,000 and $50,000 grants annually for OS research MIB Testing & Research Directory The Osteosarcoma Project partner with Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard ... Kids are still dying with 40+ year old treatments. Help us MakeItBetter. https://www.mibagents.org​ Help support MIB Agents, Donate here https://give-usa.keela.co/embed/YAipuSaWxHPJP7RCJ SUBSCRIBE for all the Osteosarcoma Intel

With Natalie Philbert, Manager of Women's Programs and Services at Hemophilia Ontario, and Dr. Meghan Pike, pediatrician and clinical fellow in Pediatric-Hematology Oncology at Dalhousie University/IWK Health Centre.   We don't always have the language to speak about our periods – let alone menstrual bleeding disorders. What are the signs and symptoms? What are the gaps in care and diagnosis? And how does it connect with gendered inequities?   May 28 was International Day of Action for Women's Health, so for the next few episodes, we're focusing on gender and health matters we may know bits and pieces of but probably need to learn more about. Today, we focus on menstrual bleeding disorders.  Natalie Philbert is a PhD candidate focusing on delay in diagnosis for menstruators with bleeding disorders. Natalie brings a professional and personal passion to the bleeding disorder community given her own diagnosis of Von Willebrand disease Type 1. She co-created a website called heroixx.ca, specifically designed for menstruators with bleeding disorders.    Dr. Meghan Pike launched the WeThrive App that can identify adolescents with heavy menstrual bleeding.  She is an advocate for free access to menstrual products. Her research interests include patient-reported outcome measures, impacts of cancer treatment on reproductive and menstrual health, and advocacy for menstruators.  Relevant links: heroixx.ca, WeThrive App (Apple App Store | Google Play)  Please listen, subscribe, rate, and review this podcast and share it with others. If you appreciate this content, if you want to get in on the efforts to build a gender equal Canada, please donate at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠canadianwomen.org⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and consider becoming a monthly donor.   Episode ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Transcripts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Canadian Women's Foundation⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@cdnwomenfdn ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Canadian Women's Foundation ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@canadianwomensfoundation⁠⁠

Dr. Eman Taryam Al Shamsi, Consultant and Head of Pediatric Hematology Oncology service at Al Qassimi Women and Children's Hospital, joins us on the Morning Majlis to discuss the important topic. We look at the importance of early detection, access to medication and increasing awareness of childhood cancer.

Sabine Simon, 4, acute lymphocytic leukemia, Sharon, CT, with dad, Eric Simon● Sabine was diagnosed in July 2022 with symptoms of bruising, sensitivity totemperatures, unusual fatigue, and petechiae (tiny round brown-purple spots due tobleeding under the skin).● The diagnosis was extremely scary at first. Her parents chose Dana-Farber fortreatment because her grandfather was treated there and they were aware of theJimmy Fund Clinic as a center of excellence.● Sabine is currently in treatment and will finish this fall. Her doctor is Jessica Pollard,MD, Pediatric Hematology/Oncology.● Sabine currently attends nursery school. She loves movement -- jumping, dancing,throwing balls. She also loves stories and dramatic play (especially toy kitchens andfood). She is interested in animals as well.● Her family is grateful to all the staff and doctors who have been exceptional. Ricardoin the cafeteria always greets Sabine with a friendly hello and remembers herchoices at the hot food station. They also love their team of nurses and clinicians, aswell as Dr. Pollard who has been a great guide through Sabine's cancer journey. Herparents feel that at Dana-Farber, they are in the exact right place for excellent carefor their daughter and the family.Acute lymphocytic leukemia facts● A type of cancer of the blood and bone marrow.● Rare – accounting for less than half of 1% of all cancers in the United States.● Acute lymphocytic leukemia is the most common type of cancer in children youngerthan 15, and treatments result in a good chance for a cure.● The word "acute" in acute lymphocytic leukemia comes from the fact that thedisease progresses rapidly and creates immature blood cells, rather than matureones. ● The word "lymphocytic" in acute lymphocytic leukemia refers to the white bloodcells called lymphocytes, which ALL affects.● Acute lymphocytic leukemia is also known as acute lymphoblastic leukemia.● ALL occurs when a bone marrow cell develops errors in its DNA.● The errors tell the cell to continue growing and dividing, when a healthy cell wouldnormally stop dividing and eventually die.● When this happens, blood cell production becomes abnormal.● Leukemic cells can travel around your body through your bloodstream and interferewith the function of your organs.

Sabine Simon, 4, acute lymphocytic leukemia, Sharon, CT, with dad, Eric Simon ● Sabine was diagnosed in July 2022 with symptoms of bruising, sensitivity totemperatures, unusual fatigue, and petechiae (tiny round brown-purple spots due tobleeding under the skin).● The diagnosis was extremely scary at first. Her parents chose Dana-Farber fortreatment because her grandfather was treated there and they were aware of theJimmy Fund Clinic as a center of excellence.● Sabine is currently in treatment and will finish this fall. Her doctor is Jessica Pollard,MD, Pediatric Hematology/Oncology.● Sabine currently attends nursery school. She loves movement -- jumping, dancing,throwing balls. She also loves stories and dramatic play (especially toy kitchens andfood). She is interested in animals as well.● Her family is grateful to all the staff and doctors who have been exceptional. Ricardoin the cafeteria always greets Sabine with a friendly hello and remembers herchoices at the hot food station. They also love their team of nurses and clinicians, aswell as Dr. Pollard who has been a great guide through Sabine's cancer journey. Herparents feel that at Dana-Farber, they are in the exact right place for excellent carefor their daughter and the family.Acute lymphocytic leukemia facts● A type of cancer of the blood and bone marrow.● Rare – accounting for less than half of 1% of all cancers in the United States.● Acute lymphocytic leukemia is the most common type of cancer in children youngerthan 15, and treatments result in a good chance for a cure.● The word "acute" in acute lymphocytic leukemia comes from the fact that thedisease progresses rapidly and creates immature blood cells, rather than matureones. ● The word "lymphocytic" in acute lymphocytic leukemia refers to the white bloodcells called lymphocytes, which ALL affects.● Acute lymphocytic leukemia is also known as acute lymphoblastic leukemia.● ALL occurs when a bone marrow cell develops errors in its DNA.● The errors tell the cell to continue growing and dividing, when a healthy cell wouldnormally stop dividing and eventually die.● When this happens, blood cell production becomes abnormal.● Leukemic cells can travel around your body through your bloodstream and interferewith the function of your organs.

Julie Nowicki PT, DPT, a physical therapist at Cleveland Clinic's Children's, joins the 100th episode of the Cancer Advances podcast to talk about the Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Mobility Program. Listen as Julie discusses the program and the benefit of physical therapy for children undergoing cancer treatments.

Dr. Huang is the Director of Center for Pediatric Immunotherapy in the Angie Fowler AYA Cancer Institute at UH Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital, Professor of Pediatrics at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, and co-leader of Immune Oncology Program at Case Comprehensive Cancer Center. He also directs the Pediatric Hematology-Oncology Fellowship Program at UH Rainbow. Dr. VanHeyst is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Angie Fowler AYA Cancer Institute at UH Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital and Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. Dr. VanHeyst has worked closely with Dr. Huang to bring a myriad of clinical trial options as direct translations from bench research to the bedside, including newly opened Phase I clinical trial using Natalizumab for treating unresectable pulmonary osteosarcoma (NCT03811886). Dr. Kristen VanHeyst completed her medical training at New York Institute of Technology School of Osteopathic Medicine, formally known as New York College of Osteopathic Medicine in 2012. She followed this with a pediatric residency at Stony Brook Children's Hospital in Stony Brook, NY, which she completed in 2015. She subsequently remained at Stony Brook Children's Hospital for an additional year to serve as a Chief Resident and Pediatric Hospitalist. Dr. VanHeyst completed her Pediatric Hematology/Oncology fellowship training in 2019 at UH Hospitals/Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital in Cleveland, OH. As a fellow, Dr. VanHeyst joined Dr. Alex Huang's laboratory in 2017 with a primary interest in metastatic pulmonary osteosarcoma. She was appointed as an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in 2019. Dr. VanHeyst continues her research efforts in understanding the role of the tumor microenvironment in metastatic pulmonary osteosarcoma. Based on pre-clinical data, she designed and authored a Phase I/II clinical trial using an anti-α4 monoclonal antibody as immunotherapy for pediatric, adolescent and young adult patients with relapsed, progressive and refractory disease. She hopes that continued efforts in understanding the mechanism by which metastatic osteosarcoma creates a pulmonary niche will lead to more therapeutic options for patients with this disease in the near future. Dr. VanHeyst is a recent recipient of the Hyundai Hope on Wheels Young Investigator Award and a K12 Clinical Oncology Research Program Paul Calabresi Scholar

This episode is sponsored by BTG Speciality Pharmaceuticals. BTG provides rescue medicines typically used in emergency rooms and intensive care units to treat patients for whom there are limited treatment options. They are dedicated to delivering quality medicines that make a real difference to patients and their families through the development, manufacture, and commercialization of pharmaceutical products. Their current portfolio of antidotes counteracts certain snake venoms and the toxicity associated with some heart and cancer medications. Their drug, Voraxaze, is for high-dose methotrexate toxicity. Brooke Bernhardt, PharmD, MS, BCOP, BCPPS is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Section of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas and the Director of Pharmacy for Global HOPE (Hematology/Oncology Pediatric Excellence). Her research interests include improving pharmacy practice globally with a focus in Sub-Saharan Africa, ethical and practical strategies for managing and mitigating medication shortages, health disparities in pediatric oncology, and the role of pharmacogenomics in pediatric oncology. She has a particular interest in antimetabolite disposition and the impact of host-related factors on toxicity and clinical outcomes.

This episode is sponsored by BTG Speciality Pharmaceuticals. BTG provides rescue medicines typically used in emergency rooms and intensive care units to treat patients for whom there are limited treatment options. They are dedicated to delivering quality medicines that make a real difference to patients and their families through the development, manufacture, and commercialization of pharmaceutical products. Their current portfolio of antidotes counteracts certain snake venoms and the toxicity associated with some heart and cancer medications. Their drug, Voraxaze, is for high-dose methotrexate toxicity. This talk will focus on research elucidating MYC amplification as the first genomic prognostic biomarker in osteosarcoma, which may be used for risk stratification in future clinical trials and to inform conversations with patients and families. Dr. Marinoff will discuss the tools used to detect MYC amplification, what we have learned about its association with outcome in children/ young adults with osteosarcoma, and what we still don't know but are trying hard to find out: the biological roles of MYC amplification in driving osteosarcoma and how it may serve as a potential therapeutic target in the future. Dr. Marinoff graduated from Harvard Medical School and completed her pediatric residency at Boston Combined Residency Program, during which time she worked with Dr. Katie Janeway on elucidating the genomic landscape of and novel genomic biomarkers in osteosarcoma. She is currently completing her fellowship training in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at UCSF, where she is focused on developing novel genome-informed therapeutics for osteosarcoma under the mentorship of Dr. Alejandro Sweet-Cordero. She plans to develop an active clinical and translational research program focused on conducting early phase precision medicine-oriented trials for patients with advanced sarcomas. She is grateful to have the best job in the world.

This episode is sponsored by BTG Speciality Pharmaceuticals. BTG provides rescue medicines typically used in emergency rooms and intensive care units to treat patients for whom there are limited treatment options. They are dedicated to delivering quality medicines that make a real difference to patients and their families through the development, manufacture, and commercialization of pharmaceutical products. Their current portfolio of antidotes counteracts certain snake venoms and the toxicity associated with some heart and cancer medications. Matteo Trucco, MD is Director Children's Cancer Innovative Therapy Program Associate Staff, Peds Hematology-Oncology & BMT at Cleveland Clinic. He received his training in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology from John's Hopkins and the National Cancer Institute and has focused his career primarily on Pediatric Sarcomas and the development of new therapies.

Dr. Aaron Weiss is a board certified pediatric hematologist/oncologist practicing in Maine. He is an associate professor and the Division Director of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology at Tufts University School of Medicine and he holds the Sam L Cohen Medical Director Endowed Chair at Maine Children's Cancer Program. As part of Children's Oncology Group he is the Vice-Chair of the Soft Tissue Sarcoma Committee, and the Associate Vice-Chair of the Clinical Trials, AYA Oncology Discipline Committee. He is an expert in Desmoid tumors and he is the chair of the Desmoid Tumor Research Foundation Medical Advisory Board. In this episode we discuss: - What led Dr. Weiss into his expertise of soft tissue sarcomas and specifically Desmoid tumors - Is a Desmoid tumor and cancer and why does the cancer classification matter? - Where do Desmoid tumors occur and the profound affect on quality of life for patients - Should the clinical trial endpoints for Desmoid tumors change? - All areas of Desmoid tumor treatment including: - Localized treatment such as high intensity ultrasound - Systemic treatment from chemotherapy to targeted therapies - The importance of active surveillance as a treatment option - Why some treatments have fallen out of favor and what is on the horizon music: Rospigg photo: Felix-Mittermeier

A clinical nurse with Pediatric Hematology-Oncology turned into “Super Nurse” in helping a young leukemia patient receive a lifesaving bone marrow transplant

Oncotarget Volume 11 Issue 15 reported that several zebrafish T-ALL models have been reported, but until recently, robust D. rerio B-ALL models were not described. Here, the Research Team has shown new B-ALL findings in one of these models, fish expressing transgenic human MYC. They describe B-ALL incidence in a large cohort of hMYC fish, and show B-ALL in two new lines where T-ALL does not interfere with B-ALL detection. Dr. J. Kimble Frazer from the Department of Cell Biology and the Department of Pediatrics, Section of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology, as well as the Department of Microbiology & Immunology, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, 73104, USA said, "Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and the related malignancy lymphoblastic lymphoma (LBL) dominate pediatric oncology, together representing over one third of all childhood cancer." For T-ALL in particular, zebrafish models have been highly informative, advancing our understanding of T-ALL genetics, pro- and anti-oncogenic interactions between different genes and pathways, tumor heterogeneity, leukemia stem cells, and in screens for new therapeutics. However, despite the fact that zebrafish T-ALL models had proven to be fertile grounds for study, B-ALL modeling in D. rerio had not been fruitful, with only one low penetrance and long latency line reported. This was curious because zebrafish recombination activating gene 2 promoters active in both immature T and B cells was used to regulate most of these transgenic oncoproteins in the various T-ALL lines, yet D. rerio B-ALL had not been reported in them. In 2018, the zebrafish ALL field advanced suddenly with reports of B-ALL in two closely-related transgenic lines where T-ALL was already known to occur. Here, the authors present new results in the hMYC model, including B- and T-ALL latency and penetrance data in a cohort of over 600 animals, in vivo glucocorticoid and radiation treatment of B-ALL, and expression profiles from single B- and T-ALL cells. The Frazer Research Team concluded in their Oncotarget Research Perspective, "We postulate these and other differences may explain the apparently disparate oncogenic mechanisms employed by hMYC and mMyc in the B lymphoblasts of these closely-related lines. Pathway analysis of differentially-regulated genes predicted differing activation of several biologic pathways (e.g., cell differentiation, immune system process, lymphocyte activation, RNA binding, etc.; Figure 6B panels and Supplementary Table 4). These markedly different pathway signatures further demonstrate that human and murine MYC are far from synonymous in terms of their oncogenic effects upon zebrafish B lymphoblasts." Sign up for free Altmetric alerts about this article - https://oncotarget.altmetric.com/details/email_updates?id=10.18632%2Foncotarget.27555 DOI - https://doi.org/10.18632/oncotarget.27555 Full text - https://www.oncotarget.com/article/27555/text/ Correspondence to - J. Kimble Frazer - Kimble-Frazer@ouhsc.edu Keywords - acute lymphoblastic leukemia, ALL, zebrafish, lymphocyte, MYC About Oncotarget Oncotarget is a bi-weekly, peer-reviewed, open access biomedical journal covering research on all aspects of oncology. To learn more about Oncotarget, please visit https://www.oncotarget.com or connect with: SoundCloud - https://soundcloud.com/oncotarget Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/Oncotarget/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/oncotarget Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/oncotargetjrnl/ YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/OncotargetYouTube/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/oncotarget Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/oncotarget/ Reddit - https://www.reddit.com/user/Oncotarget/ Oncotarget is published by Impact Journals, LLC please visit https://www.ImpactJournals.com or connect with @ImpactJrnls Media Contact MEDIA@IMPACTJOURNALS.COM 18009220957

MIB Agents OsteoBites S2 Ep 17: Lara Davis, MD, OHSU Knight Cancer Institute “New Osteosarcoma Clinical Trials” ... Guest Information: Lara E. Davis, MD Associate Professor Knight Cancer Institute Co-Leader, Translational Oncology Research Program Sarcoma Disease Site Leader Oregon Health & Science University Lara Davis, MD graduated from Wellesley College and then went on to receive her medical degree from OHSU. After training in a dual Internal Medicine and Pediatrics residency program at Harvard, she returned to Portland to complete a combined Adult and Pediatric Oncology fellowship with a focus on Adolescents and Young Adults (AYAs). Dr. Davis joined the faculty at OHSU in 2013, where she is a member of the Knight Cancer Institute with dual appointments in the Division of Medical Oncology and Pediatric Hematology/Oncology. She focuses exclusively on sarcoma in both the clinic and in the laboratory. ... Hosted by: Ann Graham OsteoWarrior and Executive Director of MIB Agents. Panelists: Annika Vallejo - MIB Junior Board Member & Osteosarcoma Sibling Valerie Nguyen - MIB Junior Board Member & Osteosarcoma Sibling … Next week we will be talking with Dr. Richard Gorlick on “Antibody Drug Conjugates”, Dr. Gorlick is the Division Head, Division of Pediatrics, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, And Professor, Department of Pediatrics at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, he is also a pediatric cancer survivor! We are looking forward to this conversation ... LINKS OutRunning Osteosarcoma: www.mibagents.org/outrunning OutBidding Osteosarcoma: www.mibagents.org/outbidding SarcTrials.org More Information on trials discussed Email: SarcomaSurvivor@ohsu.edu … What We Do at MIB Agents: PROGRAMS: ✨ End-of-Life MISSIONS ✨ Gamer Agents ✨ Agent Writers ✨ Prayer Agents ✨ Healing Hearts Bereaved Parent Support ✨ Ambassador Agents - Peer Support EDUCATION for physicians, researchers and families: ✨ OsteoBites, weekly webinar & podcast with thought leaders and innovators in Osteosarcoma ✨ MIB Book: Osteosarcoma: From our Families to Yours RESEARCH: ✨ Annual MIB FACTOR Research Conference ✨ Funding $100,000 annually for OS research ✨ MIB Testing & Research Directory ✨ The Osteosarcoma Project partner with Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard ... Kids are still dying with 40+ year old treatments. Help us MakeItBetter.

In this special episode dedicated to medical students, residents and fellows, Dr. Josh Prudent and Dr. Amrit Misra join me as we talk about mental health training, mental health advocacy, addressing our own biases as practitioners, how ACE impacts the populations we serve, and the stigmatization around practitioners' own mental health struggles. Mental health concerns affect all areas of medicine and pediatrics is no different. Because pediatrics provides an opportunity for prevention and early identification, it is critical that our trainees receive in-depth mental health training in order to promote emotional well-being. Josh Prudent is a 2nd-year Pediatric Resident at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, and the District 5 resident representative to the American Academy of Pediatrics. He completed medical school at the John Hopkins School of Medicine. Dr. Prudent is pursuing a fellowship in Pediatric Hematology-Oncology. His advocacy interests include immigrant and refugee rights, vaccine advocacy, youth mental health and behavioral health, and secure patient pediatric research funding.  Amrit Misra is a 3rd-year Pediatric Cardiology fellow at Children's Hospital of Michigan. He completed medical school at the University of Michigan and completed his Internal Medicine-Pediatrics training at Detroit Medical Center. He served as one of the Pediatric Chief Residents at Children's Hospital and his clinical interests include adult congenital cardiology, community and global health, and transitional medicine.  Please join me in welcoming Dr. Prudent and Dr. Misra    [00:01 - 03:54] Opening Segment Dr. Amrit Misra talks about his background and his involvement in the American Academy of Pediatrics.    [03:55 - 8:54] Advocacy Projects for Mental Health   Dr. Misra talks about the AAP's Section On Pediatric Trainees' focus on mental health for this year's annual advocacy campaign  [08:55 - 15:42] Are Medical Students, Residents, and Fellows Receiving Adequate Mental Health Training?    Dr. Misra's thoughts on how medical school and residency can further bridge the gap of training required to fit the vast needs of mental health.   Dr. Josh Prudent joins the interview and gives his thoughts. [15:43 - 29:41] How Are You Integrating Your Adverse Childhood Experiences Training Into the Work You Are Doing?    Dr. Prudent incorporates ACEs into his patient's medical care and talks about the nuances of approaching these conversations with clients.     Dr. Misra shares where he sees ACEs impact his patients  The need to provide more holistic care and for pediatricians to uncover biases within themselves in order to properly diagnose   Approaching biases with a level of humility and desire to improve patient care.  [29:42 - 44:06] Medical Students and Mental Health  The stigmatization around mental health and the shame and fear of failure surrounding getting help.   Burnout and the shift in perspective of making sure medical students are aware of their wellness  Dr. Prudent and Dr. Misra share their appreciation for very good attendings  [44:07 - 49:37] IWhat Advice Would You Give Your Younger Self?   Dr. Misra would tell his younger self to relax and enjoy the process.  Dr. Prudent advises to maintain strong relationships with your friends at every stage in your life.  How does a resident find out about the Section on Pediatric Trainees (SOPT)? (Links below)  [49:38 - 52:11] Closing Segment Finals takeaways Trainees have a very special place in the AAP's Section On Pediatric Trainees The SOPT dedicated all their activities to mental health for their annual advocacy campaign We need more mental health training in medical training  They have seen the impact of ACE on the populations they serve

Dr. Chinni Pokala is a doctor of Pediatric Hematology & Oncology at Oklahoma Children's Hospital in the Jimmy Everest Center for Cancer and Blood Diseases in Children. Emmi and Katherine talk to Dr. Pokala about his journey from Texas to Oklahoma and how he chose to specialize in caring for children with leukemia, lymphoma, and blood diseases. Dr. Pokala has amazingly found time to run 27 marathons, including the Boston Marathon where he raised $19,000 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. He's currently competing in the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's Man of the Year Campaign. Please welcome Dr. Pokala to Action City. You can donate at https://pages.lls.org/mwoy/ok/okc21/hpokala  

What are our must do's to cure cancer? How is translational research affecting this? How do we mentor the next great physicians? In this episode of The Doc Talk division chief of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplant at Nationwide Children's, professor of Pediatrics at Ohio State and the Leader of the Center for Childhood Cancer and Blood Diseases at Nationwide Children's. Dr. Tim Cripe.  Dr. Cripe discusses his accomplished research career within the cancer field, how to build the best team, and his thoughts on mentorship.

In the final installment of this series of ASPHOcast, ASPHO Well-Being Special Interest Group Chair Dr. Jonathan Fish and Vice Chair Dr. Adit Tal provide their perspectives on the larger physician wellness conversation. In reviewing previous episodes of ASPHOcast, they discuss the specific takeaways and recommendations as they relate to the Pediatric Hematology/Oncology field. Dr. Jonathan Fish is Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra / Northwell and serves as the Head of Stem Cell Transplantation and the Medical Director of the Survivors Facing Forward Program at Cohen Children's Medical Center / Northwell Health. Dr. Adit Tal is Assistant Professor of Pediatric Hematology, Oncology, and Cellular Therapy at the Children's Hospital at Montefiore (CHAM) and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. She is the Assistant Program Director for the Pediatric hematology/oncology fellowship program, serves on the faculty well-being committee, and develops wellness programs for the pediatric fellowship programs at CHAM. The mission of the ASPHO Well-Being Special Interest Group is to develop and maintain a community of practice with which to facilitate discussion, establish collaborative curriculums, and share approaches to addressing drivers of distress, thereby contributing to the well-being of ASPHO members. We encourage all ASPHO members to join the Well-Being SIG and contribute their experiences and ideas. More information can be found on the ASPHO website.

In the fourth episode of ASPHOcast, guest Dr. Mike Engel discusses his perspectives on division and department culture as it relates to clinician wellness, particularly as it relates to personal and professional integration. Dr. Engel is currently Professor of Pediatrics and Division Chief in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine. He also serves as Vice Chair of Pediatric Research at UVA.

Host Tim Cripe welcomes his new Co-Host, Dr. Brenda Weigel, to reflect on her career, leadership, and focus areas since her last interview on TWiPO in 2017. Dr. Weigel is the Director of the Division of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at the University of Minnesota's Cancer Center, Chair of Developmental Therapeutics in the COG, and Chair of the Pediatric Early Phase Clinical Trials Network (PEP-CTN) for the NCI.   She is at the epi-center for getting new drugs into the clinic for children with cancer and shares her perspective on the impact of the game-changing RACE Act that was implemented in 2020. She weighs in on prioritization of same-class drugs, evolving clinical trial design for small patient populations, and the increasing need for international collaboration in conducting clinical trials. She also discusses the importance of quality-of-life assessments and patient-reported outcomes and shares the efforts ongoing in the US and EU regulatory landscape to advance drug development for children with cancer.

Dr. Simpson is a Pediatric Hematologist-Oncologist at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) and an Assistant Professor at the University of Ottawa. She completed medical school at McGill University, Pediatrics residency and Pediatric Hematology/Oncology fellowship at the University of Toronto, and a Master's of Public Health from Johns Hopkins in the United States. Dr. Simpson is currently the Medical Director of the Sickle Cell Program and Interim Director of the Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Fellowship Training Program at CHEO. Her area of research interest centres on improving the outcomes for individuals with Sickle Cell Disease. Show notes available at northernexposurepodcast.ca

Giving Back- When the Patient Becomes the Provider with Lauren HeaslipWelcome to Difficult Conversations-Lessons I Learned as an ICU Physician with Dr. Anthony Orsini. This week is extra special because my guest is extra special to me. My niece, Lauren Heaslip, is joining me to share her incredible story. I promise you that you won’t want to miss this one. Lauren Pender Heaslip was born prematurely at only 31 weeks gestation. That’s 9 weeks early! Her mother had a condition called Placenta Percreta, which caused her to hemorrhage profusely. After an emergency Cesarean Section was performed. both mother and daughter clinged to life kept alive by ventilators. Happily, they both survived. At the age of sixteen, Lauren needed emergency surgery to reconstruct the vertebrae in her neck. Two weeks later, she was diagnosed with Lymphoma and was forced to face another medical challenge. Lauren shares how she and her family didn’t let the diagnosis define her and how she continued to live a life of normalcy. Thankfully, she is cancer free and remains cured until this day. Currently, Lauren is twenty-four years old and is working as a registered nurse in the Pediatric Hematology-Oncology ward at the Children’s Hospital of Cincinnati, treating children with cancer. Lauren tells us her story starting when she was a happy sixteen year old, playing sports, feeling healthy, and then the neck pain started. She remembers hearing her doctor and her parents talking in the hallway and heard the word “tumor.” She clearly remembers her first conversation with the doctor, when she was told she had Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. Lauren describes the instant bond she felt with the doctor, who became her primary oncologist. Dr. Orsini explains the three most important goals doctors should have when giving bad news. Lauren tells us about her first conversation with her parents after and the story of how her doctor kept reminding her at every visit that, “Your life does not stop, and your life cannot stop because of this.” Lauren tells us a story about her prom and the side effects of her chemotherapy. She also tells us how she decided what type of nurse she wanted to be, and about the impact that one of her chemotherapy nurses had on her decision. Lauren tells us how she uses her experience as a former cancer patient to help her patients and how she decides whether or not to share her story with her patients. She gives an AMAZING answer! Lauren shares personal insight on how she speaks to her cancer patients. She gives advice to any teenager who was just told by their doctor that they have cancer. She also gives advice to doctors and healthcare practitioners about how to give bad news to someone. Host:Dr. Anthony OrsiniGuest:Lauren HeaslipFor More Information:The Orsini WayThe Orsini Way-FacebookThe Orsini Way-LinkedinThe Orsini Way-InstagramThe Orsini Way-TwitterIt’s All In The Delivery: Improving Healthcare Starting With A Single Conversation by Dr. Anthony OrsiniResources Mentioned:Children’s Hospital of CincinnatiChildren’s Hospital of PhiladelphiaSusan Rheingold, MD (Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia)

We talk with our sarcoma brother and world-renowned sarcoma genomics scientist and pediatric oncologist Dr. Brian Crompton. Dr. Crompton is an Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School and an Attending Physician of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Dana-Farber/Boston Children’s Cancer and Blood Disorders Center. He is the Principle Investigator of the Crompton Lab where he and his team are harnessing novel genomic and proteomic approaches to improve patient outcomes in pediatric solid tumors. They leverage innovative technologies to determine prognostic biomarkers and validate druggable targets in Ewing's Sarcoma and Osteosarcoma. In this episode Dr. Crompton breaks down the current state of genomics and personalized medicine and the future for us. We talk about all the things: genomics, liquid biopsies, ct-DNA, etc. To read more about Dr. Crompton's laboratory and/or donate to his amazing research click here.

September is Childhood Cancer and Sickle Cell Awareness Month. In this episode of the Inside Pediatrics Podcast, Dr. Girish Dhall shares exciting news from the Pediatric Hematology-Oncology team, including new collaborations and clinical trials available to patients, research and fellowship training opportunities, and a significant jump in the division's U.S. News & World Report ranking among the top programs in the country.

Dr. Michael Douvas is an Associate Professor of Medicine in Hematology and Oncology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine. Dr. Douvas received his undergraduate degree in Economics from Princeton University and his MD from the University of Virginia. He completed both his residency in Pediatrics and his fellowship in Adult and Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at the University of North Carolina. Dr. Douvas treats a variety of patients between ages 15-40 for various cancers. He also has been involved in several research publications and clinical trials on leukemia, lymphoma, and sarcoma. Dr. Douvas has been on the Best Doctors in America List from 2013-2020 and took 2nd place for Best Bedside Manner Awards in the OurHealth Charlottesville and Shenandoah Valley Magazine in 2019. Tune in to learn all about sarcomas: bone vs. soft tissue sarcomas, symptoms, diagnoses, treatments, and much more.

Dr. Luke Maese is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatric Hematology and Oncology at the University of Utah and a co-Director of the Leukemia/Lymphoma program at Primary Children's Hospital. He received his Bachelor's in Human Biology from the University of Kansas and his degree in osteopathic medicine (DO) from Kansas City University. He completed his residency in Pediatrics at the UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and his fellowship in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at the University of Utah. Dr. Maese has been involved in many research publications and clinical trials on pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Tune in to learn all about the symptoms, diagnoses, and treatments of acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Survivorship Care Planning with David Poplack, MD and Ellen Shohet, RN with Passport For Care, an interactive website that addresses the need to provide long-term survivors of #ChildhoodCancer and their caregivers with screening guidelines and resources individualized to the survivor's treatment history. ... Guest Information: *Ellen Shohet, MN, RN Nurse Navigator, Passport For Care Baylor College of Medicine Texas Children's Hospital *David Poplack, MD Director of Texas Children's Hospital Cancer and Hematology Centers for 25 years. Associate Director of the Cancer and Hematology Centers Director of Global Hematology-Oncology Pediatric Excellence (HOPE) Developer of the Passport for Care®. ... Panelists: Alexis Johnson, OsteoWarrior MIB Agents Jr. Board Member MIB Mission Commander Amanda Braunfeld Levine, OsteoWarrior Founder- FaceBook Group for #osteosarcoma Patient Advocate Hosted by Ann Graham MIB Agents Founder & President. … Register for next week when Peter Anderson, MD, PhD, Pediatric Hematology Oncology at Cleveland Clinic shares Osteosarcoma information and answers general osteosarcoma questions. ... MIB Agents is a leading pediatric #osteosarcoma nonprofit dedicated to Making It Better for our community of patients, caregivers, doctors, and researchers with the goal of less toxic, more effective treatments and a cure for this aggressive bone cancer. More information at www.mibagents.org --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/mibagents/support

This week Bobbi Conner talks with Dr. Michelle Hudspeth about treating childhood cancer during the coronavirus crisis. Dr. Hudspeth is the Division Chief of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and she is the Director of the Pediatric Blood and Marrow Transplant Program at MUSC Shawn Jenkins Children’s Hospital. Request a transcript.

Dr. Oshrine specializes in blood and marrow transplants as a pediatric hematologist/oncologist in the Johns Hopkins All Children’s Cancer & Bone Marrow Disorders Institute. His clinical focus is in the treatment of high-risk leukemias with blood and marrow transplantation, and his research focus is in immune recovery after transplant. He joined the hospital in 2014 after completing a fellowship in pediatric hematology/oncology at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. He received the Excellence in Service & Professionalism Award in the 2018 Johns Hopkins Medicine Clinical Excellence Awards. Dr. Oshrine earned his medical degree from the University of Virginia School of Medicine and completed his residency at Boston Children’s Hospital. He is certified by the American Board of Pediatrics and a member of the American Society of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology, the Children’s Oncology Group, the American Society of Blood and Marrow Transplantation and the American Society of Clinical Oncology. You can see his full bio at https://www.hopkinsallchildrens.org/Find-A-Doctor/Practitioner-Details/Benjamin--Reed--Oshrine. White Coat Story is a podcast series for school students to gain first-person insights into the practice of medicine, and what it takes to get there.

In 2009, physician, researcher, and science writer, Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee, published his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer. In it, he describes the story of cancer as a human story marked by ingenuity, resilience, and perseverance, but also hubris, paternalism, and misperception. On November 13, 2019, a panel of physicians and researchers from the VCU Massey Cancer Center discussed the impact of Mukherjee’s book and the groundbreaking advances in cancer research, treatment, and prevention that has emerged during the past decade. A reception will follow the lecture. INTRODUCTORY REMARKS: Ross Mackenzie — Retired Syndicated Columnist and Editor of the Editorial Pages of The Richmond News Leader and the Richmond Times-Dispatch MODERATOR: Peter F. Buckley, M.D. — Dean, VCU School of Medicine PANEL: Walter Lawrence, M.D. — Founding Director, VCU Massey Cancer Center Steven Grant, M.D. — Shirley Carter and Sture Gordon Olsson Chair in Cancer Research; Professor and Eminent Scholar, Internal Medicine, School of Medicine; Associate Director for Translational Research, VCU Massey Cancer Center; Program Co-Leader, Developmental Therapeutics John M McCarty, M.D. — Professor of Medicine, G. Watson James Endowed Professor of Hematology; Interim Chief, Division of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology; Medical Director, Cellular Immunotherapies and Transplant Program; Medical Director, Cellular Therapeutics Laboratory; VCU Massey Cancer Center This was the third program in our Health in History Series, a partnership between the MCV Foundation and the Virginia Museum of History & Culture and sponsored by the Virginia Sargeant Reynolds Foundation.

This JCO Podcast provides observations and commentary on the JCO article “Maintaining Outstanding Outcomes Using Response and Biology-Based Therapy for Intermediate-Risk Neuroblastoma: A Report From the Children's Oncology Group Study ANBL0531” by Twist et al. My name is Javed Khan, and I am Deputy Chief and Senior Investigator at the Genetics Branch and an Attending for the Pediatric Oncology Branch of the National Cancer Institutes of the NIH in Bethesda, Maryland. My oncologic specialty is Pediatric Hematology Oncology. Childhood cancer is a life-threatening disease where survival rates have increased exponentially to over 75% over the past three decades. However, this has come at a considerable cost with significant incidence of late effects including hearing loss, scoliosis, hypothyroidism, growth and development delay, infertility, psychological, emotional, cognitive and neurological sequelae, and secondary malignancies. Most of these late effects have been attributed therapy including chemotherapy, surgery and radiation. In the manuscript that accompanies this podcast, Twist et al report on the results of the Children’s Oncology Group study ANBL0531, whose primary aim was to reduce therapy for subsets of children aged =95% for the entire cohort. Neuroblastoma is an extracranial pediatric malignancy of neural crest origin that has often been described as an enigmatic cancer due to its significant clinical, molecular and biological heterogeneity. For example, some patients with widely metastatic disease are cured with minimal or no therapy whereas others have relentless progression to death despite intensive therapies.  There has been considerable progress in dissecting out the causes of this heterogeneity and developing prognostic biomarkers to stratify the risk based on several clinical, histological and molecular markers. At the time this clinical study was performed, and the manuscript written, the authors stratified patients using several clinical and biologic parameters including age, the International Neuroblastoma Staging System, MYCN amplification status, the International Neuroblastoma Pathology Classification of histopathology, and tumor DNA index. An additional marker utilized in this study was loss of heterozygosity determination of the tumors at chromosome bands 1p36 and 11q23. This stratification strategy has led to the identification of low and high-risk groups where therapy is more clearly defined and patients with low risk have excellent outcome for most patients with surgery alone and watchful waiting. For high-risk disease, significant strides have been made using a combination of surgery, aggressive chemotherapy, radiation followed by Chimeric Antibody 14.18 anti GD2 therapy, GM-CSF, IL-2 and Isotretinoin, however the five-year survival remains guarded at 40-50%. In the intermediate-risk group, the subject of this study, although the 5-year survival rates of 90-95% have been achieved, this group is significantly heterozygous raising the possibility of reducing therapy for subsets of patients within this group. This was the motivation for this study. Thus, the goal of this clinical protocol, ANBL0531, was to refine the minimal therapy needed to achieve excellent outcomes for patients with intermediate-risk neuroblastoma, with the aim to maintain an overall 3-year OS rate of > 95% for the entire cohort. Patients were stratified into Groups 2, 3, or 4, who were assigned to receive a minimum of 2, 4, or 8 cycles of chemotherapy, respectively. Chemotherapy was identical to that used on a previous study A3961. Reduction of therapy was planned to be achieved for patients with biologically favorable tumors (Groups 2 and 3) by using the achievement of Partial Response (PR) to chemotherapy +/- surgery to be the endpoint of therapy, rather than the achievement of Very Good Partial Response (VGPR) as was previously used on A3961. If the treatment endpoint was not achieved after completion of the scheduled chemotherapy courses, additional cycles of therapy could be administered, and patients re-evaluated following every 2 cycles to determine if the treatment endpoint has been achieved. VGPR, a more stringent response criteria, was used for Group 4 patients which includes those with age< 365 days, stage 4 disease, MYCN-not amplified, and either Unfavorable Histology (UH) or DNA Index or Ploidy (DI)=1. Patients within this subgroup received 8 cycles of chemotherapy on A3961, which was a reduction in therapy for these patients compared to prior studies. Group 4 patients also includes 2 subgroups who were previously stratified as high risk including those who had stage 3 disease, age 365- < 547days, stage 3, MYCN-NA, UH, any ploidy and also those with stage 4 disease, age 365 - < 547 days, MYCN-NA, FH, DI>1). These patients also received Isotretinoin (13-cis-retinoic acid, Accutane) for maintenance therapy, as they would have previously received this treatment on high-risk protocols. Thus, these patients would receive a significant reduction in therapy compared to prior studies.  These patients were closely monitored by interim stopping rules. Rescue therapy for this study for patients with an inadequate response to initial therapy and for patients with progressive, non-metastatic disease utilized standard cyclophosphamide and topotecan. Reduction of therapy was also planned and achieved on their study by reducing potential surgical morbidity for patients with stage 4S disease, who would no longer be required to undergo resection of their primary tumor. In the manuscript, the authors report that 404 evaluable patients were enrolled between 2007 and 2011, They found that compared to legacy COG studies, subsets of patients with locoregional disease, infants with stage 4 or 4S tumors, and toddlers with stage 3 or 4 disease had a reduction in treatment. The 3-year event-free survival (EFS) and OS were 83.2±1.9% and 94.9±1.1%, respectively. Infants with stage 4 favorable biology tumors (n=61) had superior 3-year EFS compared to patients with >= unfavorable biological feature (n=47; 86.9±4.4% versus 66.8±7.0%; p=0.02), with a trend towards OS advantage (95.0±2.8% and; 86.9±5.1% respectively p=0.08. For patients with localized disease OS was 100%. They conclude that comparable/excellent survival was achieved with this biology- and response-based algorithm, with reduction of therapy for subsets of intermediate-risk neuroblastoma patients. However, more effective treatment strategies are still needed for infants with unfavorable biology stage 4 disease. For the 32 infants with hyperdiploid, favorable histology (FH) stage 4 tumors with LOH at 1p36 or 11q23, or missing LOH data, intensification of treatment on ANBL0531 compared to A396110 did not reduce the risk of relapse previously reported for infants with tumors that harbor these genetic anomalies. Three-year EFS for this cohort was 68.6% (95% CI: 52.2-85.1%) versus 86.9% (95% CI: 78.3-95.4%) for stage 4 infants with favorable biology (p=0.04). Overall survival was not significantly different, indicating that many of the infants with 1p36/11q23 aberrations were successfully salvaged. Of the 20 patients who received CPM/TOPO due to an inadequate response to initial therapy, 9 achieved ≥VGPR. However, 6 of the 20 patients developed PD or relapsed, and 1 died, indicating that more effective treatment is needed for patients who do not meet the defined treatment endpoint after 8 cycles of chemotherapy. Take home messages: This is an important study with clinical implications for intermediate-risk neuroblastoma where the authors show that it is possible to reduce therapy based on a clinical Partial Response (PR) endpoint compared to Very Good Partial Response (VGPR). This most likely reflects the biology of the disease such that tumors that are responding to therapy will continue to involute. However, more effective therapy is needed for those patients who develop progressive disease (PD) or relapse or do not meet the defined treatment endpoint after 8 cycles of chemotherapy as these patients continue to have poor outcome. This will await the result of current biological and genomic studies and the development of novel therapies targeting ALK or RAS, or epigenetic targeting of MYC or MYCN activated tumors, or immunotherapeutic approaches such as adoptive cell therapies consisting of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR T cell) or, NK cells, or the use of immunocytokines such as hu14.18-IL2 or antibody drug conjugates. All these holds promise for future sub-stratification and new therapies for children with intermediate and high-risk neuroblastoma. This concludes this JCO Podcast. Thank you for listening.

The Department of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology is building a culture that equips caregivers with skills and tools to best respond to patients and families with complicated questions and for support of one another.

In March, Madison had repetitive sinus and ear infections and long-term abdominal pain. Her pediatrician decided to conduct blood work and found abnormal results. Further tests and procedures confirmed that Madison had leukemia.Her treatment has consisted of many different rounds of chemotherapy, steroids, bone marrow biopsies, and lumbar punctures.Madison's family includes her mother, Julie, 38, father, Chris, 39, and sister, Kennedy, 6.Madison is a rising junior at East Bridgewater Junior Senior High School. In her spare time, she loves hanging out with her friends and family.Her favorite part of the Jimmy Fund Clinic is hanging out with the nurses. She also loves Dr. Place for his sense of humor throughout her treatment.Dr. Place specializes in the treatment of childhood leukemia and lymphoma.  Dr. Place is also a clinical investigator studying novel targeted therapies in relapsed acute leukemia.He is a nationally recognized clinical trialist in pediatric oncology and serves on leadership committees of several large consortia including the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute ALL Consortium, the Therapeutic Advances in Childhood Leukemia Consortium and the Children's Oncology Group. Dr. Place is also the Chief Medical Officer of the Institutional Centers for Clinical and Translational Research at Boston Children's Hospital. Dr. Place earned his MD and PhD degrees at Dartmouth College prior to completing his Pediatric Residency and Pediatric Hematology/Oncology fellowship at Boston Children's Hospital and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.  Dr. Place joined the Pediatric Hematology/Oncology faculty in 2012.

My guest on the podcast this week is Alex Zhavoronkov, CEO of Insilico MedicineOn a day to day basis, Alex is the CEO of Insilico Medicine (www.insilico.com), which is focused exclusively on developing and applying deep learning methods to drug discovery. It’s probably the largest next-gen AI and bioinformatics company in the world focusing exclusively on aging and age-related diseases.Alex is also the director of the Biogerontology Research Foundation and the founder of the International Aging Research Portfolio. He heads the laboratory of regenerative medicine at the Center for Pediatric Hematology-Oncology and Immunology and is the adjunct professor at the Buck Institute for Research in Aging in Novato, California and the international adjunct professor at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology.As an anti-aging expert, he is convinced that even people past their 70s, who are in good health, should set their longevity expectations to live past 150. It is a realistic goal considering the current longevity records and progress in technology. Stretching longevity expectations may help delay or reverse the psychological aging.This inspired me to invite Alex to my podcast, to explore how technology can be used to accelerate progress in this field, how it can augment researchers around the world to create breakthroughs that will ultimately increase longevity for all of us.We discuss the big idea behind his company to extend healthy productive longevity, first by understanding the size of the challenge, from there exploring how technology can help to address the challenge, and if applied the right way, the magnitude of the impact it could create. Here are some quotes: “Aging is one of the major challenges that humanity is facing today. The population has tripled over the past 70 years, and the population also got older.”“We need to identify new ways to keep people in their optimal healthy state for as long as possible, just to ensure that the economy remains intact.” “There is lots and lots of data available for aging research, but AI takes it to the next level. It basically accelerates everything. Think about this as a carriage versus Formula 1.”“If you are pursuing aging research and you find a way to extend the life of everybody on the planet by one year, you generate seven billion, well, seven‑and‑a‑half billion, quality-adjusted life years. That is really the scale we're talking about."By listening to this podcast you will learn the following:1) Why the best innovations start with the end goal in mind2) How, by clearly defining your Business Model upfront, you can avoid delays and unpleasant surprises3) Why data privacy is becoming a critical aspect of innovation success.4) And why it’s key to surround yourself with like-minded people who share the same passion, and are not just in for the money. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

In this podcast, co-Hosts Dr. Robyn Dennis and Dr. Ryan Roberts had the honor of interviewing Dr. Brenda Weigel, Director of the Division of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Weigel discusses her “serendipitous” background story of how she became involved in childhood oncology, as well as talks about the challenges the field faces with managing new cancer therapies. But, despite the challenges, she is hopeful that we are moving away from chemotherapy treatments into an era of cancer therapies that “hopefully, has the potential to cure the cancers and improve the quality of life”. 

Bob John, PharmD hosts PPAG Conversations, the official Podcast of the Pediatric Pharmacy Association. Dr. John speaks with experts in the field of pediatric pharmacy to discuss current issues in pediatric pharmacy, including pediatric and neonatal critical care, general pediatrics, and hematology/oncology. During this Podcast, Dr. John hosts Tara Higgins, who highlights a newly published article in the Journal of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology, titled, "Retrospective Evaluation of Palifermin Use Nonhematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant Pediatric Patients," By Liu and colleagues. About the Guest Tara Higgins is an active member of PPAG, where she has served PPAG through numerous leadership positions. Tara, currently serving on the PPAG Board of Direcctors, was membership committee chair elect and chair (2013-2015) and chair of PPAG Fall Specialty Conference- Hematology/Oncology Planning Committee (2016). Currently, Tara serves PPAG as chair of hematology/oncology Special Interest Group (SIG) (2012-present), section lead for hematology/oncology section of PPAG board prep (2016- present), member of PPAG membership committee (2009-present) and member of PPAG BCPPS Recertification Committee (2016- present). Tara also helped start the PPAG student group at the University of Florida and continues to serve as the faculty advisor for PediaGators. Tara is Co-Director of the PGY-2 Pediatric Pharmacy Residency and is a clinical specialist in pediatric hematology/oncology/BMT at UF Health Shands Children’s Hospital. In addition, Tara serves as clinical assistant professor at the University of Florida College of Pharmacy. She received her Doctor of Pharmacy from the University of Rhode Island. Tara completed her PGY1 pharmacy practice residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and a PGY2 pediatric pharmacy residency at the University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center.     About the Host of PPAG Conversations Bob John, Pharm.D., BCPS, BCPPS, a member of the PPAG Board of Directors, is currently a NICU Clinical Pharmacy Specialist at The Children’s Hospital at Saint Francis and the Residency Program Director for his institution’s PGY1. He completed a PGY1 residency at Saint Francis Hospital and a PGY2 residency at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. He spent his first two years after residency working as the Pediatric Pulmonology Specialist at Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics, after which he worked as a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatric Pharmacotherapy, Department of Pharmacy at The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy. Dr. John has been involved with the development of a pharmacy-driven pharmacokinetic monitoring service, NICU dosing weight protocol, and served on the evidence-based medicine committee, in which he has helped develop clinical practice guidelines at his institutions. Dr. John has been an active member of PPAG since 2007. In addition to being a member of the education committee, he has served as the chair of the webinar committee, and the education committee where he organized the educational content provided at the 2016 PPAG annual meeting. In 2015, he and his colleagues were recognized by PPAG with a Best Practice Award for their development of an outpatient on call service. He was awarded the Presidential Citation from PPAG in 2014 and 2016. He currently chairs the web-based competency committee, working to provide additional educational content in new ways to PPAG members. In addition to his work in PPAG, he served as Chair of the Pediatric PRN for ACCP.   Introduction music credits: "Reverie (small theme)" by _ghost 2010 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0)  

LIVE from Phoenix Children’s Hospital. Host: Dr. Peter Hofland (www.oncozine.com). Dr. Ratan Dev Bhardwaj, Neurosurgery, focuses his research on a particularly aggressive pediatric type of brain cancer called atypical teratoid/rhabdoid tumor or AT/RT. Dr. Robert Arceci, Pediatric Hematology/Oncology, is co-dir. of the Ron Matricaria Institute of Molecular Medicine and dir. of the center for children’s cancer and blood disorders program. His focus is Translational Genomics Research Institute known as T-Gen. Joni live M-F at 2:00 p.m. ET on www.W4CS.com. www.JoniAldrich.com

in 2010, author Chris Adrian was named to The New Yorker's "20 under 40" list of fiction writers worth watching. He is currently a Fellow in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at the University of California San Francisco. He is also the author of several novels and a collection of short stories. Series: "Story Hour in the Library" [Humanities] [Show ID: 20627]

in 2010, author Chris Adrian was named to The New Yorker's "20 under 40" list of fiction writers worth watching. He is currently a Fellow in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at the University of California San Francisco. He is also the author of several novels and a collection of short stories. Series: "Story Hour in the Library" [Humanities] [Show ID: 20627]

Join Kathleen Casey, President/Founder of Bear Necessities Pediatric Cancer Foundation and guests, Kelly Kramer,RN,MSN from University of Chicago Comer Children's Hospital and from RUSH University Medical Center, Paul Kent, MDAssistant Professor of Pediatrics Senior Attending Physician in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology for an overview and discussions on pediatric/childhood cancer.

Join Kathleen Casey, President/Founder of Bear Necessities Pediatric Cancer Foundation and guests, Kelly Kramer,RN,MSN from University of Chicago Comer Children's Hospital and from RUSH University Medical Center, Paul Kent, MDAssistant Professor of Pediatrics Senior Attending Physician in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology for an overview and discussions on pediatric/childhood cancer.