2008 Breast Cancer Symposium Awards $14,000 To Oncology Fellows

Main Category: Cancer / Oncology
Also Included In: Women's Health / Gynecology
Article Date: 28 Aug 2008 - 2:00 PDT

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Organizers of the 2008 Breast Cancer Symposium announced the winners of the Symposium Merit Awards. Fourteen physicians-in-training will receive funding to assist with their travel to attend the Symposium, to be held September 5-7 in Washington, DC.

"We are proud to honor this year's Merit Award winners for their outstanding contribution to the advancement of breast cancer research," said Funda Meric-Bernstam, MD, chair of the Symposium Steering Committee and Associate Professor in the Department of Surgical Oncology at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. "These bright young fellows represent the promising future of clinical oncology and our increased commitment towards improving patient care."

The ASCO Cancer Foundation Merit Awards are designed to promote clinical research by young scientists and provide fellows with an opportunity to present their research and interact with other clinical cancer investigators at ASCO scientific meetings. This year's awardees are the second group of physicians to receive ASCO's Merit Awards in breast cancer and represent institutions from across the globe. Awardees were selected based on the scientific merit of their abstracts and will present their research during the Symposium.

The 2008 Breast Cancer Symposium has expanded this year to a two-and-a-half-day multidisciplinary symposium in order to provide more feature presentations on the latest multidisciplinary research from selected theme-based translational, and clinical abstracts, as well as related educational sessions. This symposium offers an opportunity for clinically relevant, in-depth discussions of how and when to translate new findings into patient care and how to be more selective about breast cancer therapy.

Co-sponsors include the American Society the American Society of Breast Disease, The American Society of Breast Surgeons, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology, the National Consortium of Breast Centers, Inc. and the Society of Surgical Oncology.

2008 Breast Cancer Symposium Merit Award Recipients

Nabil Wasif, MD
John Wayne Cancer Institute
Survey of ASCO members on management of sentinel node micrometastases in breast cancer: lack of adherence to established guidelines

Grace L Smith, MD, PhD
M.D. Anderson Cancer Center
Racial disparities in treatment for early invasive breast cancer: a national Medicare study of radiotherapy after conservative surgery

Marieke E Straver, MD
EORTC
Patterns of care in the EORTC AMAROS sentinel node trial

Sonal Gandhi, MD, BSC
University of Toronto
Continuing aromatase inhibitors (AIs) beyond the 5-year mark: how much benefit is enough? A survey of patients and physicians

Mangesh A Thorat, MD
Indiana University School of Medicine
Metaplastic breast cancers show a gene expression profile distinct from basal-like breast cancers

Philip Wong, MD
McGill University Health Center
The use of 3D-ultrasound in tracking surgical cavity displacement during breast radiotherapy

Shaheenah S Dawood, MD
Department of Health and Medical Services
Triple receptor negative breast cancer: The effect of race on response to primary systemic treatment and survival outcomes

Heather B Neuman, MD, MS
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Do patients with stage IV breast cancer and intact primary benefit from local control of the breast as a component of multimodality therapy?

Mahsa Mohebtash, MD
NCI/NIH
Vaccine alone or with chemotherapy in patients with metastatic breast cancer (mBC)

Ricardo H Alvarez, MD
University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center
Discordance rates of HER-2 expression between breast primary tumors and paired metastases using archived tumor specimens

Christine Simmons, MD
Princess Margaret Hospital
Phase II study of Vitamin D (10, 000 IU daily) supplementation in Bisphosphonate Treated breast cancer patients with bone metastases

Tienhan S Dabakuyo, PharmD
Centre Georges François Leclerc
A multicenter cohort study to compare quality of life in breast cancer patients according to sentinel lymph node biopsy (SNLB) or full axillary clearance (AC)

Sumanta K Pal, MD
City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center
Lack of survival benefit in metastatic breast cancer with newer chemotherapy agents: The City of Hope cancer experience

The 2008 Merit Awards are funded through The ASCO Cancer Foundation and are supported by restricted educational grants from the American Cancer Society, Amgen Oncology, Aptium Oncology, Bristol-Myers Squibb and ImClone Systems Incorporated, Celgene Corporation, Lilly Oncology, Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Novartis Oncology, Onyx Pharmaceuticals, Inc., OSI Oncology, sanofi-aventis U.S. and Wyeth.

ASCO Cancer Foundation