TheoryLab

Starting with a breakthrough discovery in 2005 as a PhD student, Marina Holz has helped change our understanding of cell biology.

In her conversation with ACS, Dr. Holz talked about her new research related to estrogen receptor-positive breast cancers. She also talked about what it’s like to be the Dean of the Graduate School of Basic Medical Sciences at New York Medical College, and she offered some great advice for young scientists.

1:45 – On her seminal 2005 paper:

At this conference last fall…there was a person sitting next to me, and she said, “isn’t it amazing that 15 years later we’re still talking about this paper?” And it really was. It was really a proud moment for me, and I was really honored that our work really made an impact and laid this foundation that is very solid.

5:00 – On her most recent publication:

In my lab—I started my lab a little over 12 years ago—we focus specifically on breast cancer, and about 70% of breast cancers are diagnosed as hormone dependent. Specifically, they are dependent on the hormone estrogen. This is what our recent paper is about—how estrogen controls protein synthesis in the cells.

9:45 – Why is it significant that 70% of breast cancer ceases are estrogen-receptor positive?

Not all patients respond to endocrine therapy. For most patients, eventually, there is some sort of resistance that develops and they stop responding. So there’s really a need to understand exactly how estrogen acts in breast cancer and what other treatments we can offer to prevent the development of resistance and to really make endocrine therapy curative, as opposed to just something that allows the disease to be more of a chronic nature.

Former American Cancer Society grantee Neha Pankow already had a transdisciplinary background in engineering, biophysics, and cancer cell biology.

Now she’s added policymaking to the mix.

As a AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the National Science Foundation, she’s helping to develop policy for gender equity, STEM education, and the pursuit of interdisciplinary science.

3:20 – On how and why she became a AAAS fellow:

“I would say I’ve been interested in policy-related issues for most of my life, but I was definitely a scientist inside, and I never knew how to bridge those two things. For me the AAAS fellowship is doing exactly that.”

10:30 – On how her experience has opened new doors:

“And I thought this too as a graduate student and as a postdoc, that any kind of sidestep from my career meant that I was going to be throwing away everything that I had done until that point of time. And that’s absolutely not true. Especially for the AAAS fellowship I’ve seen friends and alumni who have either go back to academia because that’s what they wanted to do, I’ve seen people who have gone into working for nonprofits, people who work for federal agencies…”

Former American Cancer Society grantee Neha Pankow already had a transdisciplinary background in engineering, biophysics, and cancer cell biology.

Now she’s added policymaking to the mix.

As a AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the National Science Foundation, she’s helping to develop policy for gender equity, STEM education, and the pursuit of interdisciplinary science.

3:20 – On how and why she became a AAAS fellow:

“I would say I’ve been interested in policy-related issues for most of my life, but I was definitely a scientist inside, and I never knew how to bridge those two things. For me the AAAS fellowship is doing exactly that.”

10:30 – On how her experience has opened new doors:

“And I thought this too as a graduate student and as a postdoc, that any kind of sidestep from my career meant that I was going to be throwing away everything that I had done until that point of time. And that’s absolutely not true. Especially for the AAAS fellowship I’ve seen friends and alumni who have either go back to academia because that’s what they wanted to do, I’ve seen people who have gone into working for nonprofits, people who work for federal agencies…”

A scientist and a storyteller, Michael Kinch has helped bring multiple drugs to clinic and authored three books.

In his new book, "The End of the Beginning: Cancer, Immunity, and the Future of a Cure, Dr. Kinch traces the history of cancer treatment and describes the extraordinary promise of immunotherapy.

As he explained to ACS, "we are amidst a truly revolutionary period where diseases that we assumed were going to kill the patient are now infinitely treatable.”

A former American Cancer Society grantee, Dr. Kinch is Associate Vice Chancellor, Director of the Center for Research Innovation, and Professor of Radiation Oncology at Washington University in St. Louis.

A scientist and a storyteller, Michael Kinch has helped bring multiple drugs to clinic and authored three books.

In his new book, "The End of the Beginning: Cancer, Immunity, and the Future of a Cure, Dr. Kinch traces the history of cancer treatment and describes the extraordinary promise of immunotherapy.

As he explained to ACS, "we are amidst a truly revolutionary period where diseases that we assumed were going to kill the patient are now infinitely treatable.”

A former American Cancer Society grantee, Dr. Kinch is Associate Vice Chancellor, Director of the Center for Research Innovation, and Professor of Radiation Oncology at Washington University in St. Louis.

In this episode we spoke with Aasim Padela, MD, and Mark Lazenby, PhD, APRN, FAAN, about the unique needs and cancer health equity issues of the Muslim American community.

Dr. Aasim Padela is an emergency medicine physician, health services researcher, and bioethicist. He’s an Associate Professor at the University of Chicago, where he’s the Director of the Program on Medicine and Religion and Director of the Initiative on Islam and Medicine. In his ACS-funded work he’s working with Muslim American communities to increase mammography screening rates.

Dr. Mark Lazenby is an Associate Professor of Nursing at Yale University. He is a philosopher of religion and an advanced practice cancer nurse. He’s interested in helping patients with a cancer diagnosis deal with the questions of mortality.

4:00 – (Lazenby) What we have found in our research so far is that Muslim patients don’t feel supported by spiritual care departments or by palliative care teams in their spiritual and religious needs. So they go to look for support outside, but often people outside of the cancer care community don’t understand cancer. So they’re caught in this bind of having no support within the cancer care community for their psychosocial/spiritual needs, and no support outside the cancer care community for the intersection of cancer needs and psychosocial/spiritual needs.

9:30 – (Padela): In my own work where I tried to assess what the particular health care disparities of Muslim patients were we found three things: (1) Gender issues/modesty issues; (2) spiritual accommodations; and (3) dietary accommodations.

14:30 – (Lazenby): We’ve found this in some of our participants—the belief that God is punishing the person for past deeds by giving them cancer. And this is not only unsettling for the patient; it’s unsettling for providers. So how do you approach this and not offend the person? And the potential for the person to draw meaning from the cancer experience. How do you turn it around from persecution to an opportunity for meaning-making?

In this episode we spoke with Aasim Padela, MD, and Mark Lazenby, PhD, APRN, FAAN, about the unique needs and cancer health equity issues of the Muslim American community.

Dr. Aasim Padela is an emergency medicine physician, health services researcher, and bioethicist. He’s an Associate Professor at the University of Chicago, where he’s the Director of the Program on Medicine and Religion and Director of the Initiative on Islam and Medicine. In his ACS-funded work he’s working with Muslim American communities to increase mammography screening rates.

Dr. Mark Lazenby is an Associate Professor of Nursing at Yale University. He is a philosopher of religion and an advanced practice cancer nurse. He’s interested in helping patients with a cancer diagnosis deal with the questions of mortality.

4:00 – (Lazenby) What we have found in our research so far is that Muslim patients don’t feel supported by spiritual care departments or by palliative care teams in their spiritual and religious needs. So they go to look for support outside, but often people outside of the cancer care community don’t understand cancer. So they’re caught in this bind of having no support within the cancer care community for their psychosocial/spiritual needs, and no support outside the cancer care community for the intersection of cancer needs and psychosocial/spiritual needs.

9:30 – (Padela): In my own work where I tried to assess what the particular health care disparities of Muslim patients were we found three things: (1) Gender issues/modesty issues; (2) spiritual accommodations; and (3) dietary accommodations.

14:30 – (Lazenby): We’ve found this in some of our participants—the belief that God is punishing the person for past deeds by giving them cancer. And this is not only unsettling for the patient; it’s unsettling for providers. So how do you approach this and not offend the person? And the potential for the person to draw meaning from the cancer experience. How do you turn it around from persecution to an opportunity for meaning-making?

Jan Eberth and Jesse Nodora are each working to eliminate cancer disparities and boost colorectal cancer screening rates.

Jan Eberth, of the University of South Carolina, is examining cancer screening accessibility in the U.S. and its impact on patient-level outcomes. She uses geospatial approaches and focuses in part on rural communities.

Jesse Nodora, of the University of California, San Diego, works closely with community health centers and aims to promote health at the individual, provider, and system level.

1:45 – On how they would describe their work to researchers in other fields:

(Eberth) “I study how processes and facets of the health care system and specific health policies impact patients who are at risk for or diagnosed with cancer…In my research I use a database of all colonoscopies that were completed in our state over a 15-year period. We link that information with our state cancer registry to help us learn more about…whether the geographic access that patients have to care is impacting their clinical outcome.”

(Nodora) “The work that I do really focuses on what I would label multi-level health promotion, specifically focused on increasing cancer screening…The multi-level part really is about addressing individual/patient level, provider team, and leadership/clinic administration level barriers and needs.”

5:25 – On the most important unanswered questions in their fields:

(Nodora) “How can law and policymakers work in partnership with researchers and other public servants to make the most equitable and impactful decisions? Often in our society, many of the high-level decisions that are made are not made for the public’s good or public health. They’re made for profit, or they’re made for the bottom line, and that is reflected in lobbying.”

(Eberth) “There have been studies that look at national- and state-level capacity, but there’s a lot less research that has looked at local-level capacity. It’s important to know where we’re losing access over time to important treatment services and screening services, so we can think about what solutions there are to halt those trends. And those might include things like: use of telehealth, use of mid-level providers, offering mobile clinics, and changing staffing patterns and credentialing requirements.”

13:40 – How they would describe their work to a colorectal cancer patient or survivor:

(Eberth) “Right now where you live, how much money you make, what type of insurance you have—it does dictate, unfortunately, where people get care and the type of care they get. To me that’s unacceptable…My research aims to find out where inequities exist—and find out why they exist—so that policymakers, clinicians, and public health practitioners can develop the types of programs and policies that are needed to address those issues directly.”

(Nodora) “The goal of what I’m trying to do at all levels–patient, provider, and system levels–at the end of the day it’s all about, for poor and underserved patients at community health centers, how do you increase those colorectal cancer screening rates?”

20:25 – The challenges of community-academic partnerships:

(Nodora) “Any kind of relationship is about trust. You want to start real early; develop the relationships, develop the trust, and basically listen to them… The one thing that there’s a real disconnect on is how long discovery takes. You want to impress upon your partners that you’re in it for the long haul.”

Jan Eberth and Jesse Nodora are each working to eliminate cancer disparities and boost colorectal cancer screening rates.

Jan Eberth, of the University of South Carolina, is examining cancer screening accessibility in the U.S. and its impact on patient-level outcomes. She uses geospatial approaches and focuses in part on rural communities.

Jesse Nodora, of the University of California, San Diego, works closely with community health centers and aims to promote health at the individual, provider, and system level.

1:45 – On how they would describe their work to researchers in other fields:

(Eberth) “I study how processes and facets of the health care system and specific health policies impact patients who are at risk for or diagnosed with cancer…In my research I use a database of all colonoscopies that were completed in our state over a 15-year period. We link that information with our state cancer registry to help us learn more about…whether the geographic access that patients have to care is impacting their clinical outcome.”

(Nodora) “The work that I do really focuses on what I would label multi-level health promotion, specifically focused on increasing cancer screening…The multi-level part really is about addressing individual/patient level, provider team, and leadership/clinic administration level barriers and needs.”

5:25 – On the most important unanswered questions in their fields:

(Nodora) “How can law and policymakers work in partnership with researchers and other public servants to make the most equitable and impactful decisions? Often in our society, many of the high-level decisions that are made are not made for the public’s good or public health. They’re made for profit, or they’re made for the bottom line, and that is reflected in lobbying.”

(Eberth) “There have been studies that look at national- and state-level capacity, but there’s a lot less research that has looked at local-level capacity. It’s important to know where we’re losing access over time to important treatment services and screening services, so we can think about what solutions there are to halt those trends. And those might include things like: use of telehealth, use of mid-level providers, offering mobile clinics, and changing staffing patterns and credentialing requirements.”

13:40 – How they would describe their work to a colorectal cancer patient or survivor:

(Eberth) “Right now where you live, how much money you make, what type of insurance you have—it does dictate, unfortunately, where people get care and the type of care they get. To me that’s unacceptable…My research aims to find out where inequities exist—and find out why they exist—so that policymakers, clinicians, and public health practitioners can develop the types of programs and policies that are needed to address those issues directly.”

(Nodora) “The goal of what I’m trying to do at all levels–patient, provider, and system levels–at the end of the day it’s all about, for poor and underserved patients at community health centers, how do you increase those colorectal cancer screening rates?”

20:25 – The challenges of community-academic partnerships:

(Nodora) “Any kind of relationship is about trust. You want to start real early; develop the relationships, develop the trust, and basically listen to them… The one thing that there’s a real disconnect on is how long discovery takes. You want to impress upon your partners that you’re in it for the long haul.”

“That’s the beautiful thing about diet. You don’t have to have health insurance to make these changes. You don’t need a physician to make these changes. You just need the right motivation and the long-term commitment.”

What you do need, though, is evidence. American Cancer Society grantees Carrie Daniel-MacDougall, PhD, MPH, of the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center and Xuehong Zhang, MD, ScD, of Brigham and Women's Hospital, are working to provide evidence that could have huge implications for colorectal cancer research.

3:10 – Carrie Daniel-MacDougall on her ACS-funded research: “With the dawning of the gut microbiome era, knowing that dry beans have various prebiotic properties, I thought it was important to revisit this question again with these new technologies and also with this growing population of colorectal cancer survivors, particularly overweight and obese survivors, who may be at risk of recurring or developing another obesity-related cancer.”

5:40 – Xuehong Zhang describes his colorectal cancer studies: “The objective of this proposed research is to determine the association between yogurt intake and colorectal cancer risk and survival. We hypothesize that higher yogurt consumption can decrease the risk of developing adenomas—the precursor to colorectal cancer—as well as improve survival among patients with colorectal cancer.”

10:05 – On some of the challenges of recruiting colorectal cancer survivors, even at one of the largest cancer centers in the country: “We’ve also learned that some of them kind of have PTSD in terms of returning to the hospital for blood draws and participation in the study… Beyond all the science and the mechanism, there’s a behavioral aspect to working with people and working with patients that’s important to recognize.”

16:00 – Next steps for Dr. Daniel-MacDougall: “The next phase, if we find that this is promising, is to go multi-center, and that’s going to be a bigger, scarier, harder-to-get grant…We’re also always building up the next thing or how we’re going to get to the next step and that’s trying to do more dietary assessments and dietary-based research in cancer patients going on to active treatment.”

18:55 – New directions Dr. Zhang would like to take his study: “…Lactic acid is much (lower) in yogurt and is more palatable to individuals with lactose intolerance, so that motivates me to think more about how to expand the current research into other racial and ethnic groups, especially among the black population.”

21:35 – What can we tell patients about primary prevention of colorectal cancer? “The vast majority of colorectal cancer can be prevented by maintaining healthy weight, being physically active, and having a healthy diet… To me the healthy lifestyle is the key to colorectal cancer primary prevention. Clearly, screening and early detection is also important.”

“Because it’s so accessible, because everyone eats and everyone has fun tweaking their diets, sometimes people forget it’s science that we actually study quite intensely in school. And so you’ll give someone your take on something and they’re like, ‘Well, but you know I’ve heard this ketogenic diet is the thing I should be doing.’ Our challenge is to keep it scientific and evidence-based…it’s a huge challenge that not a lot of people face in other fields.”