News

The Blue Ridge Institute for Medical Research has released its 2018 rankings of NIH funding for basic and clinical science departments, revealing that Duke Surgery ranks highest nationwide with more than $30 million in funding committed to research.

Studies fail to show early benefit, but changing landscape may increase utility of cross-sectional imaging   PET-CT for the initial staging of patients with stage 2 melanoma rarely showed evidence of distant metastatic disease, according to results presented in a poster session on October 11, 2018, at the American Society for Dermatologic Surgery annual meeting in Phoenix, AZ.

Congratulations to George Kasotakis, MD, MPH, Assistant Professor of Surgery in the Division of Trauma and Critical Care Surgery, who received a 3-year scholarship to attend the Eastern Association for the Surgery of Trauma (EAST) Leadership Development Workshop held during the annual Scientific Assembly. Dr. Kasotakis attended the first session in January 2019 in Austin, Texas.  

Please join the department in congratulating Laura Horst Rosenberger, MD, Assistant Professor of Surgery in the Division of Surgical Oncology, whose abstract has been accepted by the Society of Surgical Oncology (SSO) for presentation at the 72nd Annual Cancer Symposium. Dr. Rosenberger will present her abstract, “Axillary Lymph Node Dissection in Node-Positive Breast Cancer: Are 10-Nodes Adequate and When is Enough, Enough?” during the Breast Parallel Session of the symposium. Abstracts were reviewed and accepted by a blind peer-review program committee.  

Separate awards will advance genomic medicine and breast cancer research   In separate awards from the National Institutes of Health, Duke University School of Medicine researchers will advance genomic medicine initiatives and develop a model for how breast cancer tumors begin and grow. The genome studies include two grants from the National Human Genome Research Institute, which is part of NIH, that will total about $9 million over five years. 

With a buzzing phone and dinging inbox repeatedly begging for her attention, Dr. Georgia Beasley momentarily tunes out the chaos to discuss the journey that led to her current position at Duke. Here, she splits her time between treating melanoma patients in the clinic and researching novel treatments for the disease in the laboratory.

Dr. Lola Fayanju, Assistant Professor of Surgery, Division of Surgical Oncology, has been awarded a Duke-NUS travel grant  to facilitate collaboration with fellow surgical oncologists and health services researchers at the Singhealth Duke-NUS Breast Centre, the largest facility providing comprehensive breast cancer care in Singapore. Her visit, during which she will also give a lecture to the host department, will take place in early 2019. Congratulations to Dr. Fayanju!

Dr. Nina Tamirisa, Fellow in Breast Surgical Oncology, has been awarded a Conquer Cancer Merit Award from the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO).

Lola Fayanju, MD, Assistant Professor of Surgery, Division of Advanced Oncologic and Gastrointestinal Surgery, presented her recent research at the American Surgical Association (ASA) Annual Meeting. Her research involved a review of 20,000 patients in the National Cancer Database, with a focus on the results of neoadjuvant chemotherapy and its link to overall survival rates.

The Duke Department of Surgery is pleased to announce the appointment of Peter J. Allen, MD, as the new Chief of the Division of Surgical Oncology in the Department of Surgery and Chief of Surgery for the Duke Cancer Institute (DCI).