When a woman is diagnosed with primary breast cancer, recurrence, or metastasis, she and her doctors have many treatment options from which to choose. In addition to radiation and surgery, there are several types of systemic therapies (chemotherapies) and targeted therapies to consider.
BCRF is funding a wide range of projects focused on maximizing the benefits of the existing therapies through adjusting the dosage, frequency, combination, and/or timing of various interventions. Clinical Innovation projects also aim to pinpoint which patients would benefit most from a specific therapy. Sometimes, oncologists discover that some patients should avoid an intervention altogether because the benefits gained are minimal compared with the potential negative side effects.
These studies also include the development of tools for diagnosis and prognosis so that physicians are able to detect the disease and determine its subtype at the earliest point possible. An innovative component of these studies is the investigation of drug resistance, as the effectiveness of a drug or another form of intervention (e.g. radiation therapy), not only seems to differ from individual to individual but also seems to decrease in effectiveness in the same person over time. BCRF grantees are trying to find out why that happens and they are developing ways to bypass resistance, making therapies effective again.
2012-2013 investigators working on Clinical Innovations are:
D. Craig Allred, MD
Carey K. Anders, MD
Carlos L. Arteaga, MD
Alan Ashworth, BSc, PhD, FRS
José Baselga, MD, PhD
Lisa A. Carey, MD
Michael F. Clarke, MD
Alan D'Andrea, MD
Nancy E. Davidson, MD
Susan M. Domchek, MD and Robert H. Vonderheide, MD, D.Phil
H. Shelton Earp, MD
Matthew J. Ellis, MD, PhD,
D. Craig Allred, MD, Kelly K. Hunt, MD, Elaine Mardis, PhD, John A. Olson, Jr., MD, and David Ota, MD
Stanislav Emelianov, PhD
Francisco J. Esteva, MD, PhD
Silvia Formenti, MD and Robert J. Schneider, PhD
Teresa Gilewski, MD and Govind Ragupathi, PhD
Mark I. Greene, MD
Daniel A. Haber, MD, PhD
Bruce G. Haffty, MD
Adrian L. Harris, BSc, DPhil, FRCP
Daniel A. Hayes, MD on behalf of The North American Breast Cancer Group (NABCG)
Daniel A. Hayes, MD and James M. Rae, PhD
Kathryn B. Horwitz, PhD
Susan B. Horwitz, PhD and Hayley M. McDaid, PhD
Hedvig Hricak, MD, PhD
Alan N. Houghton, MD, Larry Norton, MD, and Jedd Wolchok, MD, PhD
James N. Ingle, MD
Benita S. Katzenellenbogen, PhD
Seema Khan, MD
Nancy U. Lin, MD
Hyman B. Muss, MD
Steffi Oesterreich, PhD
Olufunmilayo I. Olopade, MD
C. Kent Osborne, MD and Rachel Schiff, PhD
Edith A. Perez, MD
Richard Pestell, MD, PhD
Lori J. Pierce, MD
Shannon Puhalla, MD
Andrew A. Quong, PhD
Neal Rosen, MD, PhD
Hope S. Rugo, MD
Bryan P. Schneider, MD
Dipali Sharma, PhD
George W. Sledge, Jr., MD
Benjamin Smith, MD
Christos Sotiriou, MD, PhD
Michael B. Sporn, MD and Karen T. Liby, PhD
Vered Stearns, MD
W. Fraser Symmans, MD
Zoltan Szallasi, MD
Shaomeng Wang, PhD
Max Wicha, MD
Michael Wigler, PhD and James Hicks, PhD
Richard C. Zellars, MD
