The UNM Comprehensive Center is expanding a program aimed at encouraging young people to explore research as a career field. In addition to a first-ever middle school component, the program is adding more opportunities for high school and undergraduates to get real world lab and research experience.
Prajakta Adsul, MBBS, PhD, MPH, from UNM Cancer Center attended the White House Cervical Cancer Forum focused on education, prevention, early detection and treatment. The Forum was held in late January.
For the first time ever in New Mexico, doctors at UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center have treated blood cancer patients by transplanting cells from a donor. Late last year, Matthew Fero, MD, FACP, and the Stem Cell and Bone Marrow Transplant team completed the first procedure, known as an allogeneic stem cell transplant.
Nearly two in five U.S. adults have high cholesterol, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center is expanding its clinical space to offer treatments that no other entity in the state can offer.
Akshu Balwan, MD, breathes easier these days because The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center launched a new comprehensive lung cancer screening clinic as part of the institution's lung cancer screening program.
The morning of Sunday Oct. 29th wasn’t too different for Albuquerque resident Nicholas Juskiewicz and Brandon Behrens, MD, a trauma surgeon at The University of New Mexico Hospital. Jusckiewicz put on his cycling kit and headed to Albuquerque’s Old Town area to start the Day of the Tread 61-mile bicycle ride.
For Gladys Tsao-Wu, MD, and Jennifer Chan, MD, reconstruction is as much about helping patients recover emotionally as it is about physical restoration. For over a decade, the two surgeons have been a team, helping breast cancer survivors in New Mexico.
In a town hall, health and health science leaders from The University of New Mexico and around the state provided answers for Sen. Ben Ray Luján, (D) New Mexico, regarding the causes and possible solutions to New Mexico’s challenges in growing and maintaining a vibrant health care workforce. They shared on ways to enhance federal partnerships that could help, including bringing more resources to New Mexico to serve as an incubator for new innovations.
The New Mexico Cancer Care Alliance (NMCCA) has rebranded as the New Mexico Cancer Research Alliance (NMCRA) to strengthen its focus on delivering cancer clinical trials to New Mexicans. Through the NMCRA’s unique collaboration, every New Mexican has access to cancer clinical trials. Cancer clinical trials test new treatments and new methods of delivering and improving cancer care.
The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center is using the feedback it gets from young adult cancer survivors to craft a support group that fits their needs.
When Prajakta Adsul, MBBS, PhD, MPH, at the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center, learned about LGBTQIA+ communities in New Mexico, she became inspired to start filling the void of information about cancer screening and survivorship in these populations. Using a novel survey, she and her team collected information from 2,500 individuals; it's the largest volume of data of its kind.
Avinash Sahu, PhD, and his team leveraged artificial intelligence, machine learning, and big data to create a novel way to discover multi-function drugs. The approach used cancer research data, biological data, and transfer learning to not only find drugs with specific properties but also to predict patient responses to them.
Human papillomaviruses (HPVs) cause several cancers in both men and women, including 91% of cervical cancers, 91% of anal cancers and 75% of vaginal cancers, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most of these cancers are caused by just a handful of HPV virus types.
More and more students are graduating with their bachelor's degrees and taking a gap year, a period of time before jumping into a postgraduate program. A new grant from the American Cancer Society will help the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center introduce these students to scientific research.
23-year-old fundraiser for the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center makes a comeback this spring.
The UNM Cancer Center will be one of a few sites in the country participating in a clinical trial to expand the application of theranostic treatment to patients with prostate cancer. This type of treatment is currently used at the cancer center for neuroendocrine tumors. The treatment is a two-part process that first injects the molecule attached to a gallium-68 radioactive isotope that can be imaged to illuminate the cancer cells, which makes them easier to see under Positron Emission Tomography, or PET scans.
Dario Marchetti, PhD, and his team at the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center found the same common genomic signature in the circulating tumor cells taken from the mice and from the people with melanoma brain metastases. And they found this signature in the circulating tumor cells that were injected in the mice, as well as in cells isolated from a person with melanoma brain metastasis who was undergoing treatment.
A former fellow at the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center, Dr. Shashank Cingam comes back to New Mexico to Treat blood cancers.
Dr. Colleen McCormick joins the University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center. Her curiosity and desire to work with patients from the beginning of their diagnosis to the end of their care led her to gynecologic oncology.
The human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine is safe and effective – but it’s not for everyone. Michelle Ozbun, PhD, and her team at UNM Cancer Center published a research article earlier this year in Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy in which they describe how a drug called protamine sulfate blocks HPV infection. Like a game of musical chairs among molecules, the drug molecules bind to heparan sulfate cell receptors, preventing HPV virus particles from doing so.
Kimberly Leslie, MD, was awarded a four-year, $1.8 million grant from the Department of Defense (DOD) to further study high-risk uterine cancer. Her research has led her to study the differences between natural progesterone and synthetic progestins – hormones often used for birth control – and the influence of progesterone on a tumor suppressor protein called p53. The hormones, drugs and proteins, she’s learned, influence each other and the body’s cells in complex ways.
Cheryl Sampson has close to 25 years in health care research administration experience at both a university cancer center and in the health system setting. It gives her a unique combination of experience that suits the unique nature of the job in New Mexico.
“I think for me, what I find most interesting about rectal cancer is the multidisciplinary and individualized care and a new trend in treatment to offer organ preservation instead of surgery in selected patients,” she said. “I love surgery, but I also know the consequences of doing surgery. I saw UNM was also interested in this treatment strategy that might be more beneficial for some patients and I wanted to be in a cancer center where I could offer that approach.”
This assistance is highly important. It ultimately affects some patients who might not otherwise be successful with treatment if they are constantly stressed with having to find the means to stay here or get here.
Bladder cancer affects nearly 84,000 people in the United States each year, making it the sixth most common cancer. Most people survive it, but unfortunately, many lose their bladders. Neda Hashemi, MD, and her team at The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center are now offering several clinical trials, including one that will give people with bladder cancer a chance to fight their disease and keep their bladders.
With all that the Land of Enchantment has to offer, skin cancer isn’t on the top on anyone’s list. But abundant sunshine and a dearth of dermatologists in the state pose a challenge for detecting and treating the various forms of skin cancer. Skin Cancer Screening clinics are now resuming. The first of several new clinics will be held in Albuquerque on Saturday, May 7. More are planned over the coming year in Gallup, Taos and southern New Mexico.
Kelly Dunn recently became board certified by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics in Oncology Nutrition.
The UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center has opened the Targeted Agent and Profiling Utilization Registry (TAPURTM) Study, sponsored by the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). The clinical trial is cancer agnostic. It may help people who have rare cancer mutations and enable them to receive personalized cancer therapy.
Alissa Greenbaum, MD, took a winding path through medicine to land in surgical oncology and lead the University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center's Peritoneal Surface Malignancy and HIPEC program.
The UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center's team of pharmacists is involved in every aspect of patient care. From preparing complicated drugs to helping patients find a way to pay for them.
Mariah Candelaria is a three-time survivor of Hodgkin Lymphoma and received a stem cell transplant at the University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center. During and after her recovery she's leaned on dance to make it through. Now she wants to give back to others who are going through similar challenges fighting cancer.
The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center has once again been awarded the highest designation and rating in the United States for cancer treatment and research programs.
The UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center helps patients with high-complexity cases. Elyse Eckart's experience with breast cancer has led her to take on new challenges and embrace tasks and activities she may not have before. She's also giving back to the community.
Like a mystery detective, Sara G.M. Piccirillo, PhD, is hunting deadly bad actors by studying the crime scene and questioning bystanders one by one. But these bad actors are cells in the brain. She is using two grants to study tumor cells and cells in the surrounding area, one by one.
UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center conducted a two-pronged study looking into the efficacy of 3D mammograms and also the general awareness of the technology among at-risk populations in New Mexico. The study was conducted prior to the technology gaining more use among the public, and showed fewer callbacks and more awareness even in its early days.
The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center is using a grant from the American Cancer Society to introduce more underrepresented minority undergraduate students to cancer research
The UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center's orthopedic oncology program helped Kyle Stepp recover from bone cancer and lead an active and generous life.
Dr. Kinjyo's work Will continue to look at how combining different drug treatments can improve outcomes for women with ovarian cancer.
Michelle Ozbun, PhD, and her team developed a way to measure how many infectious human papillomavirus particles are left on a surface after it has been disinfected. They found that disinfectants approved for use on medical devices work well, and they recently published their work online in The Lancet journal EBioMedicine.
Experienced radiation oncologist Cherie Hayostek, MD, joins the team at the University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center in Albuquerque, NM.
Ben Ferguson joins the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center as surgical oncologist. It was the complexity of cancer care that drew him to the specialty and the resources of a comprehensive cancer center that drew him to UNM.
Stewart Livsie is the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center's manager of maintenance and construction and was honored by the IFMA recently. He was instrumental in securing necessary PPE and other supplies to ensure the UNM Cancer Center remains operational during COVID-19 restrictions. He's also overseen multimillion dollar expansions to the center.
Itzhak Nir, MD, named first-ever Elsie P. Barry/Cowboys for Cancer Research Endowed Professor in Hepato-Pancreatico-Biliary and Oncology Surgery at The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center. Cowboys for Cancer Research has been a longtime supporter of the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center and is committed to addressing New Mexico’s most important cancer challenges through funding research initiatives and creating endowed professorships.
Fahy named one of 10 endowed professors created by the Surface Family Trust. Fahy has been with UNM since July 2013 when she was an associate professor of Surgical Oncology. In 2015, she was named associate professor of Internal Medicine in the Division of Palliative Medicine.
Our DNA acts like a book of recipes for making proteins. But if a recipe is wrong, what does a cell do Peng Mao, PhD, and his team discovered an intricate series of events that cells use to repair our DNA as the recipes are being read. Their findings could lead to improved cancer treatments.
Liquid biopsies hold promise of finding cancer in blood before they can form new tumors
Ala Ebaid, MD, completed his fellowship in hematology/oncology at the UNM Cancer Center in June and begins clinical work in August. He's been in New Mexico for a decade, and he says he doesn't plan to leave any time soon.
A quintessential part of facing any kind of challenge is reaping the rewards when you’ve successfully met it. It’s an adage that can be applied to nearly any profession, including surgical oncology, and it’s what brought Vinay Rai, MD, FACS, FASCRS, to the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Ivan Piñón, MD, once thought his future would lead to the lab bench. But a long career practicing as an endocrinologist has led him to the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center to serve as a crucial part of the effort to build a thyroid and parathyroid center of excellence.
RSS
Medicine keyboard_arrow_right
Sciencekeyboard_arrow_right
Life keyboard_arrow_right
Business keyboard_arrow_right
Journal News keyboard_arrow_right
By Location keyboard_arrow_right
Meetings, Grants, and Events keyboard_arrow_right