Women in Oncology: How Early Treatments Paved the Way for Future Advances

Catherine E. Lai, MD, MPH, an associate professor and physician leader of the Leukemia Clinical Research Unit at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine, moderates a discussion with Selina M. Luger, MD, FRCPC; Gail J. Roboz, MD; and Wendy Stock, MD, on the issues that were most prominent in leukemia treatment when they began their careers.

Luger is an attending physician, professor of medicine, and interim director of the Penn-Vinmec Oncology Center of Excellence at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Roboz is a professor of medicine and the director of the Clinical and Translational Leukemia Program at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University and the NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital. Stock is the Anjuli Seth Nayak Professor of Medicine and a professor in the Comprehensive Cancer Research Center at the University of Chicago Medicine.

In this episode, Luger, Roboz, and Stock discuss the challenges that accompanied the lack of progress in leukemia treatment when they began their fellowships and express their excitement about encouraging developments that have since emerged in the arena, such as hyperfractionated cyclophosphamide, vincristine, doxorubicin hydrochloride, and dexamethasone (hyper-CVAD) and high-dose cytarabine. They also share their thoughts on being some of the first people at their institutions to use treatments like arsenic trioxide in acute promyelocytic leukemia and autologous stem cell transplant in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML).

Additionally, the 3 experts explain how they enacted their early fascination with the biology behind the disease through studying gene deregulations and mutations, measuring minimal residual disease, and conducting quantitative southern blot monitoring of CML. They also reflect on how far the leukemia field has advanced as a whole, from struggling with the limited choices in their armamentarium to having an array of more effective therapies for a variety of leukemia subtypes.