Breast Cancer 2023 Donor Impact Update Our first Breast Fellow, Dr. Christopher Porter, started this August. We are so excited to have him as our inaugural fellow. We have also confirmed/matched a fellow for the 20242025 academic year. Thank you all for helping to make this fellowship possible!
Chris’ Personal Statement
“My interest in breast surgery has run through every level of my education. In high school, I took a medical explorations course and shadowed my hometown breast oncology practice and was allowed to continue this each year in undergraduate. During residency, my favorite work has been not only breast cases but also evaluating data points and creating databases from previous breast oncology patients. Simply, I have always known I wanted to work in breast oncology.” Residency has further confirmed that breast oncology is what I want to become great at, and a program and faculty with a mission. I vow to continue to improve myself and be the fellow you enjoy coming to work with each day; to be reliable, honest, hardworking, self-sacrificing and at times, an ability to bring lightheartedness to each day.”
Team Excellence “Breastics24h” was a 24-hour event in September aimed at providing education to those who are beginning their training in breast surgery. Dr. Shawna C. Willey, Peterson Chair, Breast Cancer Research, is serving on their Board of Directors and helps reinforce Inova’s reputation as a leading part of an international organization, alongside fellow eminent and highly experienced surgeons and faculty members from all around the world. New adjuvant trial for ER+ HER2 negative survivors between years 2 and 5 of any endocrine therapy (tamoxifen or Ais, premenopausal or post-menopausal). Our goal is for our breast team to be a top accrual site in the U.S and the world.
Research
Dr. Kathleen Harnden, Director of the Breast Medical Oncology Program at Inova, was quoted in an article in Cancer Today magazine this summer. A new oral hormonal therapy offers an alternative to injections for some women with metastatic disease. Dr. Harnden was a principal investigator on the phase III trial and co-author of the study published in October 2022 in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
“For patients, this is a big win in terms of quality of life,” Harnden says.