Download Four promising scientists chosen as Southwest Oncology

Southwest Oncology Group
http://swog.org
734-998-7130
A National Cancer Institute-sponsored Clinical Trials Network
headquartered in Ann Arbor, Mich.
September 10, 2007
For more information, contact:
Southwest Oncology Group
734-998-7130
Anne Rueter, [email protected]
or Kati Laszlo, [email protected]
For Immediate Release
Four promising scientists chosen as Southwest Oncology
Group Young Investigators
Three-day course trains young physicians in how to pursue cancer clinical trials
ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The Southwest Oncology Group (SWOG), one of the nation’s largest
cancer clinical trials networks, has selected four talented researchers at the beginning of their
careers for its Young Investigators Training Course. They are attending the intensive threeday class Sept. 10-12 at the SWOG Statistical Center in Seattle.
Experienced clinical investigators, statisticians and research coordinators from the Southwest
Oncology Group will prepare the Young Investigators to successfully develop and administer
cancer clinical trials.
The 2007 SWOG Young Investigators are: Leona B. Downey, M.D., assistant professor of
medicine, Section of Oncology, University of Arizona, Tucson, Ariz.; Daniel O. Persky, M.D.,
assistant professor of clinical medicine, University of Arizona, Tucson, Ariz.; Paul D. Maroni,
M.D., assistant professor in the urology division of the Department of Surgery, University of
Colorado School of Medicine, Denver, Colo.; and Vincent Chung, M.D., assistant professor,
Department of Medical Oncology, City of Hope National Medical Center, Duarte, Calif.
To compete for the honor, each candidate submitted an idea for a clinical trial in his or her field.
During the course, each Young Investigator develops the idea further in an intensive simulation of
the protocol development process. The course provides training in statistical principles, data
collection and analysis, and critical decision-making.
Here are the Young Investigators and their projects in brief:
Leona Downey, M.D., University of Arizona: Downey is especially interested in effective
treatments for breast cancer in older women. Estrogen-blocking treatments are a prime form of
therapy, but women in many cases develop resistance to these medications and need to go on to
chemotherapy, whose side effects are especially troublesome for older women who may have
other health problems.
“My project for the SWOG YI training course hopes to identify a way to reverse that hormone
resistance so that breast cancers will again be sensitive to hormonal treatments, allowing patients
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to continue to have a favorable response to hormonal therapies and avoid the transition to
chemotherapy,” says Downey.
“Laboratory work has suggested that high-dose estrogen can achieve this reversal of hormone
resistance. We plan to evaluate this in post-menopausal women with advanced breast cancer
who have progressed on prior hormonal therapy. We will be using several laboratory correlates to
better understand how hormone resistance occurs, and how the reversal of that resistance can
be achieved,” she says.
Daniel O. Persky, M.D., University of Arizona: Persky is interested in refining the use of a new
molecularly targeted therapy that may help lymphoma patients.
“A new class of drugs called histone deacetylase inhibitors (HDACI) work by helping the
chromosomes unwind, allowing activation of genes that were silenced before,” he explains.
“One of these genes is a master controller of the immune recognition molecules called MHC class
II. Previous work at the Arizona Cancer Center showed that lymphoma patients with low levels of
MHC class II molecule expression have a worse prognosis.” Persky says the course offers him an
opportunity to do work related to an ongoing SWOG trial that is examining the merits of giving
lymphoma patients these kinds of drugs, which promise to aid their immune systems.
“The next step is to see if pre-treating with a HDACI would help standard chemotherapy work
better in newly diagnosed lymphoma patients,” Persky says.
Paul Maroni, M.D., University of Colorado: Maroni is interested in finding out if a prostate
cancer cell-freezing procedure can benefit patients with metastatic prostate cancer.
“Our study will attempt to prospectively analyze if treatment of the primary tumor has any impact
in patients with metastatic prostate cancer,” Maroni says. “Patients will receive routine treatment
with hormone deprivation therapy and will also receive a prostate-freezing procedure called
cryoablation. The very low temperatures should kill prostate cancer cells in and around the
prostate. These patients will be monitored to see if there is any promising response to therapy.”
Vincent Chung, City of Hope National Medical Center: Chung is interested in improving the
prognosis for people with pancreatic cancer, for whom effective treatments are sorely needed.
“Over the last decade, there has been an explosion of knowledge in understanding the pathways
leading to uncontrolled cell growth,” he says.
“Tarceva, which is a targeted therapy, was the first targeted agent to show a survival benefit in
pancreatic cancer when used in conjunction with gemcitabine chemotherapy. However, this
combination only led to a two-week survival benefit. There is an urgent need to understand these
pathways and how to target them. Targeting these pathways may help to circumvent
chemotherapy resistance and improve prognosis in patients with pancreatic cancer.”
Costs of the Young Investigators Course are paid for with a gift from the Hope Foundation
(www.thehopefoundation.org), a philanthropic arm of the Southwest Oncology Group which
raises funds for educational and research efforts.
The Southwest Oncology Group (http://swog.org) is one of the largest cancer clinical trials cooperative groups in
the United States. Funded by research grants from the National Cancer Institute, part of the National Institutes of
Health, the group conducts clinical trials to prevent and treat cancer and to improve the quality of life for cancer
survivors. The group's network of more than 5,000 physician-researchers practice at nearly 550 institutions,
including 16 National Cancer Institute-designated cancer centers. Headquartered in Ann Arbor, Mich. (734-9987130), the group has an operations office in San Antonio, Texas and a statistical center in Seattle, Wash.
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