I am a pulmonologist and clinician scientist with a research focus in health services research for patients with lung cancer at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). My long-term research goal is to improve care delivery for patients newly diagnosed with lung cancer, especially as it relates to precision medicine therapies. My clinical time is spent evaluating patients suspected to have lung cancer in a multi-disciplinary thoracic oncology clinic, performing bronchoscopy for diagnostic or staging purposes, and collaborating on cases through our multi-disciplinary thoracic tumor board. Biomarker testing performed on patient's lung cancer tissue continues to grow in importance in driving precision medicine treatment decisions, especially as new therapies and indications emerge for both targeted and immune therapies.
I witness, first-hand, many issues surrounding obtaining tissue and accomplishing biomarker testing for patients newly diagnosed with lung cancer. These issues span the spectrum from obtaining enough tissue for testing, choosing which assays to use to perform testing, coordination across sub-specialties, gaps in knowledge and values by physicians to perform testing, and navigating these issues to achieve timely and comprehensive results. Motivated by the needs of patients, I became interested in the responsibility of pulmonologists and other sub-specialists to achieve timely and comprehensive biomarker testing for patients with lung cancer.
I serve as co-principal investigator on a grant from the American Cancer Society (ACS) to assess biomarker testing and treatment patterns in nationally representative databases. I am the co-lead faculty for the ACS Extension for Community Health Outcomes (ECHO) for biomarker testing in South Carolina, and I am a member of the ACS National Lung Cancer Roundtable (NLCRT) Triage for Appropriate Treatment Task Group.
