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Anna Vilgelm, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor, Pathology
The Ohio State University
Columbus, Ohio
Current Research
- Seeking to identify new strategies to improve response to anti-cancer therapies.
- Laboratory studies are conducted to test a combination approach to improve the effectiveness of CDK4/6 inhibitors.
- This research has the potential to generate novel effective therapies for advanced estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer.
CDK4/6 inhibitors, such as Ibrance®, Kisqali® or Verzenio®, have dramatically extended the lives of patients with some forms of metastatic breast cancer. Unfortunately, patients eventually become resistant to these therapies. Cancer immunotherapies stimulate the immune system to launch an anti-tumor attack. While these therapies have been successful in some cancers, few breast cancer patients have benefitted. Drs. Vilgelm and Arteaga are conducting studies to determine whether adding an immunotherapy drug to CDK4/6 inhibitor will improve outcomes in patients with estrogen receptor-positive metastatic breast cancer.
Full Research Summary
Biography
Dr. Anna Vilgelm is an assistant professor in pathology at The Ohio State University. She received her MD from the Russian State Medical University in Moscow, Russia and her PhD is from the Engelhardt Institute of Molecular Biology in Moscow, Russia,. She conducte her thesis work at Vanderbilt. The main focus of her research program is on design and preclinical evaluation of novel therapeutic strategies for treatment of metastatic cancers, including breast cancer and melanoma. The approach is to use clinically relevant tumor models to design rational combinations of novel and emerging cancer therapies, including tumor-targeting and immune-stimulating therapies, to ultimately improve treatment outcomes for cancer patients.
