Associate Professor, Department of Surgical Oncology
Attending Surgeon
Marvin S. Greenberg, MD, Chair in Pancreatic Cancer Surgery
Associate Program Director, Complex General Surgical Oncology Fellowship
Co-Director, Marvin & Concetta Greenberg Pancreatic Cancer Institute
Collaborating Member, Molecular Therapeutics
NCCN, Hepatobiliary Cancers Panel Member
Hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC), gastric cancer, hepatobiliary cancer, general and minimally invasive surgery
| Surgery |
I decided to join the Fox Chase Cancer Center team in conquering cancer because I saw first-hand the dramatic difference we can make here. I decided to continue my training in Philadelphia after completing my general surgery residency in New York City, under the tutelage of my father, also a surgeon who spent many years treating cancer. I completed a two-year fellowship in complex surgical oncology at Fox Chase, working closely with various multidisciplinary teams in caring for patients with colorectal, liver, pancreatic and stomach cancers, in addition to melanoma and sarcomas. Being trained by leaders in the field, I had the unique opportunity to hone my skills and expertise, and apply them to my own clinical practice.
I have extensive training in traditional open surgery, as well as laparoscopic and robotic techniques, allowing me to offer individualized care to patients. I have particular interests in the management of sarcomas and colorectal, melanoma and pancreatic cancers. The implementation of minimally-invasive surgical techniques to the management of colorectal cancer is routinely offered at Fox Chase, and similar techniques are used to address pancreatic diseases. I also have a keen interest in the use of hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC), following cytoreductive surgery for cancer of the peritoneum, including appendix cancer, peritoneal mesothelioma and pseudomyxoma peritonei. In addition to this, there is a necessity to understand the benefit of, and perform further research, incorporating HIPEC in patients with colorectal and gastric cancers, which our team will explore further.
The benefit of an NCI-designated cancer center is that we are able to offer many innovative strategies in treating all types of cancers. Whether through a national clinical trial or particular surgical technique, we optimize patient care to the individual. I believe the physician-patient relationship is one of the foundations to building a plan to treat cancer, and I offer guidance through each stage of treatment. Medicine has always been a family-oriented field for me; with my father being a surgeon, and mother an anesthesiologist, I take great pride in offering compassion and honesty in formulating individualized treatment plans for every patient and his or her family.
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In January 2022, I listened to my body, and it may have saved my life. I initially went to the doctor because I had hemorrhoids that had been acting up for about a week. Not only was an over-the-counter medication not working, but I had also noticed a change in the color of my stool. Together, these were red flags that something wasn’t right.
In September of 2022 I was a healthy retiree, living with my husband and enjoying life. A year later, I am a pancreatic cancer survivor.
Last year, I began to have gastrointestinal issues that concerned me. All of my life, I’ve had issues with going to the bathroom, but my doctors always told me that what might be abnormal for other people might be normal for me.
Early in 2019, I started to experience an uncomfortable feeling whenever I sat down on a hard surface. Little things like riding my bike or just resting on a bench started to hurt a little. At first, it wasn’t that bad, so I just ignored it and hoped it would go away on its own.
My wife Catrina was the first to notice something was wrong. I remember we were out playing Topgolf one day when she told me that the whites of my eyes looked really yellow. Later on, my skin would start to itch, and my urine would turn a dark shade of yellow, but my eyes were the first to show any signs. I told her that I felt fine, but she insisted that I should get it checked out.
My research interest for colorectal malignancies focuses on the use of national cancer databases to assess the accuracy of clinical staging, to see if this has improved over time, and to observe reporting standards between academic institutions versus other centers. As treatment of colorectal cancers involve multimodality planning, accurate clinical staging proves to be the foundation on how best to deliver care.
I also have a strong research interest in the vascular resectability staging of pancreatic cancer. Currently under review is our preoperative venous and arterial staging for borderline resectable pancreatic cancers and whether we are able to predict from preoperative imaging the likelihood of clear margin achievement and prognosis. As treatment of borderline resectable pancreatic cancer continues to evolve, accurate preoperative vascular resectability staging is imperative to assess and guide multimodality therapy.
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