Mesothelioma.com: Dr. David Sugarbaker Continues To Make Advancements In Treatment Of Mesothelioma Cancer

Dr. David Sugarbaker is a leading thoracic oncologist and considered an expert in the diagnosis and treatment of malignant pleural mesothelioma.

He began his medical career by attending Wheaton College, followed by medical school at Cornell University. His residencies were completed at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Toronto General Hospital, and the Hospital for Sick Children at the University of Toronto. He also completed fellowships at The Charles A. Dana Research Institute, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Dr. Sugarbaker received his surgical board certificate in 1979 followed by another board certification in thoracic surgery ten years later. In the academic world, he has worked as an assistant and associate professor at Harvard Medical School.

Mesothelioma is a rare and fatal form of cancer that is caused by asbestos exposure. On average only around 3,000 new cases are diagnosed annually in the United States. There are difficulties in diagnosing the disease due to sharing similar symptoms with other illnesses, as well as a long latency period that can take twenty to fifty years for symptoms to appear. Once the disease has been discovered, it is often too late for effective treatment.

However, through his research, Dr. Sugarbaker is trying to change those statistics. His research mainly focuses on combining aspects of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation into the mesothelioma treatment program. This new multi modality program, or the trimodality approach, gives patients more options and a greater chance of success in their fight against cancer. In one example, radiation and surgery may be combined and the patient would undergo radiation therapy in order to shrink a tumor to an operable size.

Dr. Sugarbaker has created the International Pleural Mesothelioma Program, which works to find more successful treatments and hopefully a cure to the disease. The program uses clinical study and laboratory research to improve life expectancies for patients. Specifically, his research focuses on five areas: translational research in lung cancer and mesothelioma, multimodality treatment and staging of malignant pleural mesothelioma, neoadjuvant therapy for non-small-cell lung cancer, treatment of esophageal cancer, and minimally invasive surgery.

Dr. Sugarbaker has published a number of scholarly writings. Last year his piece, “Phase III Trial of Trimodality Therapy With Cisplatin, Fluorouracil, Radiotherapy, and Surgery Compared With Surgery Alone for Esophageal Cancer” was published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. Two other pieces, “Lung resection in patients with preoperative FEV1<35% predicted” and “Phase I to II Study of Pleurectomy/Decortication and Intraoperative Intracavitary Hyperthermic Cisplatin Lavage for Mesothelioma” were also published in previous years.

Currently, Dr. Sugarbaker is the Chief of Thoracic Surgery at Brigham and Woman’s Hospital as well as the Chief of Surgical Services at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. As he continues his research and treatments, he wants those suffering from mesothelioma to know progress is being made. He advises patients, “most of all, upfront, to let them know that there is hope and that there is treatment for mesothelioma. Because many patients come in and don’t have the idea that there is treatment available and that their disease is treatable, and that they can live longer than what they thought they could.”

Sources:

Dana Farber Cancer Institute Physician Profile

Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Mesothelioma.com