Experts from the Department of Radiation Oncology will make more than two dozen presentations at the 62nd annual American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) Annual Meeting, held virtually October 24-28.
October 19, 2020
Experts from the Department of Radiation Oncology will make more than two dozen presentations at the 62nd annual American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) Annual Meeting, held virtually October 24-28.
A phase II/III trial led by Winship radiation oncologist and prostate cancer specialist Ashesh B. Jani, MD, MSEE, FASTRO, and Winship nuclear radiology specialist David Schuster, MD, FACR, will be featured in both the plenary session and press program of the ASTRO annual meeting on Monday, October 26. The Emory Molecular Prostate Imaging for Radiotherapy Enhancement, or EMPIRE-1 trial, is the first randomized trial of prostate cancer patients with recurring cancer to show results on a cancer control endpoint from treatment based on advanced molecular imaging. The trial used the FDA-approved PET radiotracer fluciclovine, which was invented and developed at Emory and Winship.
Kristin A. Higgins, MD, lung cancer expert and associate professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology, will participate in three oral presentations during ASTRO: a late-breaking special session for her abstract, "Patterns of Disease Progression After Carboplatin/Etoposide + Atezolizumab in Extensive-Stage Small-Cell Lung Cancer (ES-SCLC)," an education session on "Radiation/Immunotherapy Combinations in Localized LC: Integration of Immunotherapy with Chemoradiation for Limited NSCLC," and an on-demand panel discussion on "Expanding the Indications for RT: Cardiac Radiotherapy."
On October 27, Clayton B. Hess, MD, MPH, will present, "Immunomodulatory Low-Dose Whole-Lung Radiation for Patients with COVID-19-Related Pneumonia" at the Late-breaking COVID-19 Scientific Session on behalf of Winship co-lead investigator Mohammad K. Khan, MD, PhD, DABR.
James E. Bates, MD, who joined the department faculty in August, will present two oral presentations on "Twenty-Year Mortality Patterns in Long Term Survivors of Early-Stage Mediastinal Hodgkin Lymphoma" and "Geographic Distribution of Radiation Oncologists and Linear Accelerators."
Winship faculty Hui-Kuo George Shu, MD, PhD, FASTRO, Jun Zhou, PhD, Nikhil T. Sebastian, MD, Sibo Tian, MD, and physician resident James Janopaul-Naylor, MD will each also deliver oral presentations during the meeting.
Xiaofeng Yang, PhD, DABR, director of Winship's Medical Physics Residency Program and assistant professor will give four poster presentations on topics ranging from learning-based real-time patient-specific volumetric imaging for lung stereotactic body radiation therapy to synthetic MRI-aided multi-organ CT segmentation for head and neck radiotherapy treatment planning.
Winship physicians Nikhil T. Sebastian, MD and Sibo Tian, MD; physicists Zhen Tian, PhD, Jun Zhou, PhD, and Liyong Lin, PhD, DABR; and medical residents Ashley Schlafstein, MD, Neal S. McCall, MD, James Janopaul-Naylor, MD, Lisa J. Sudmeier, MD, PhD, David C. Qian, MD, PhD, and Sarah A. Westergaard, MD will also give poster presentations at the virtual conference.
Director of Radiation Therapy Maxine Washington and nurse manager at Emory Saint Joseph's Hospital Walter Chin will present their abstract "Algorithm to Analyze Patient Through-Put in Radiation Oncology" during an oral presentation at the Society of Radiation Oncology Administrators (SROA) meeting, held concurrently with ASTRO. Amy Breakstone, MPH, administrator of clinic operations at the Emory Proton Therapy Center, and Caroline Herrera, supervisor of business operations at the Emory Proton Therapy Center, will present a poster on their abstract, "Integration and Utilization of Electronic Patient Reported Outcomes (ePROs) in a Radiation Oncology Practice."
The theme of this year's conference is Global Oncology: Radiation Therapy in A Changing World. Highlights of the conference include a talk by Anthony S. Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases; Patrice Harris, MD, immediate past president of the American Medical Association, who will discuss the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on physicians and healthcare professionals; and Ibram X. Kendi, PhD, director of the Center for Antiracist Research at Boston University, who will give a keynote address on racial inequity and its relation to healthcare.