Breast Cancer Trials

Associate Professor Lesley Stafford is a clinical psychologist in psycho-oncology and women's health, with a specific interest in women with or at risk of breast cancer. She consults in the Breast Service and Familial Cancer Centre at the Royal Melbourne Hospital as well as in private practice, and is an Associate Professor at the University of Melbourne.

Dr Shom Goel is a clinician-scientist at the University of Melbourne and Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, with a strong interest in Translational Breast Cancer Research. He was a guest speaker at the 2022 Breast Cancer Trials Annual Scientific Meeting and we asked Dr Goel to explain his research in CDK4/6 inhibitors and where research is going in the future.

Finding My Way is an online coping program for individuals who have been diagnosed with cancer. The program is designed to support people through their cancer diagnosis, as well as help to provide strategies to live well despite this diagnosis. We talk with Associate Professor Lisa Beatty as she explains what 'Finding My Way' is and how it was initiated.

As part of a Clinical Fellowship project with Breast Cancer Trials, Dr Christine Muttiah is aiming to assist in the clinical conduct of the BRCA-P study in the hopes to increase recruitment across all 14 Breast Cancer Trials BRCA-P sites. We asked Dr Muttiah to provide an overview of this project and its aims.

As part of a Clinical Fellowship project with Breast Cancer Trials, Dr Elizabeth Blackley is working on a study that involves the collection of data and the development of a registry on breast cancer incidents, treatment outcomes and quality of life metrics in young Australian women. The aim is to help form a streamlined model of care for young women and offer various support services to help them through their diagnosis.

Dr Elizabeth Blackley is working on a study that involves the collection of data and the development of a registry on breast cancer incidence, treatment, outcomes, and quality of life metrics in young Australian women. The aim is to help form a streamlined model of care for young women and support services, such as genetic counselling, psychosocial support, fertility specialist consultation, survivorship, premature menopause, and sexual health clinics.

Dr Christine Muttiah is aiming to assist in the clinical conduct of the BRCA-P study and is focusing on strategic communication and leadership to enable sites to develop and establish recruitment pathways through familial cancer and risk management clinics; in the hopes to increase recruitment across all 14 Breast Cancer Trials BRCA-P sites.

Professor Prue Francis is a Medical Oncologist and the Clinical Head of Breast Medical Oncology at the Perter McCallum Cancer Centre. Professor Francis is researching into Metastatic breast cancer, asking the question: Does Detecting Metastatic Disease Early Make a Difference? We asked Professor Francis to explain her research on this topic.

Dr Hope Rugo is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Hematology and Oncology at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr Rugo is a Principal Investigator of multiple clinical trials focusing on combining novel targeted therapeutics with standard treatment. We asked Dr Rugo to explain her research topic: New Options in HR+ Breast Cancer - TROPICS-02 and beyond.

Health economics is used in clinical trials to ensure information is being collected in the right way, so that it can be provided to the minister or committees such as the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee, so that they can compare new treatments with existing treatments to decide what drugs should be funded in the public system. We asked Associate Professor De Abreu Lorenco to explain what health economics is, and how it is currently used in clinical trials.