FDA Involvement in Dose Optimization Through Project Optimus Drives a Patient-Focused Oncology Pharmacology Career: With D. Ross Camidge, MD, PhD; and Jeanne Fourie Zirkelbach, PhD

How This Is Building Me, hosted by world-renowned oncologist D. Ross Camidge, MD, PhD, is a podcast focused on the highs and lows, ups and downs of all those involved with cancer, cancer medicine, and cancer science across the full spectrum of life’s experiences.

In this episode, Dr Camidge sits down with Jeanne Fourie Zirkelbach, PhD, a clinical pharmacologist in the Office of Clinical Pharmacology in the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research at the FDA.

Drs Camidge and Zirkelbach discuss how Zirkelbach got her start in the pharmacokinetics field; her involvement with Project Optimus, an initiative by the FDA’s Oncology Center of Excellence that works to reform dose-optimization and -selection paradigms in oncology drug development; and how her research with patient-reported outcomes emphasizes the importance of keeping patient needs, preferences, and experiences at the forefront of drug development to minimize the effects of cancer treatment on quality of life.