Decision-Making for Relapsed/Refractory Myeloma March 20, 2021 Myeloma Round Table

Myeloma survivor, patient advocate, wife, mom of 6. Believer that patients can help accelerate a cure by weighing in and participating in clinical research. Founder of the HealthTree Foundation.

Greg Brozeit has been engaged in myeloma patient advocacy since 1998. He began working with the Myeloma Crowd in 2015. Prior to that, he consulted with Dr. Bart Barlogie at the University of Arkansas after working with the International Myeloma Foundation for 15 years, where he inaugurated the public policy advocacy program, patient support group outreach and IMF Europe, organizing more than 100 physician and patient education programs. He earned his BA in political science from Loyola University in New Orleans and lives in northeast Ohio.

Noa Biran, MD, is an associate professor in the Myeloma Division of the John Theurer Cancer Center at Hackensack University Medical Center in New Jersey. She is actively involved in clinical research with a focus on high-risk disease and the role of minimal residual disease in multiple myeloma. Dr. Biran has presented a range of clinical work at international and national conferences such as the American Society of Hematology and the Society of Hematologic Oncology. She is widely published in hematology and oncology journals such as the American Journal of Hematology, Current Hematologic Malignancy Reports, and The Hemophilia Report. She has also co-authored the chapter “Oncologic Emergencies” in Essentials of Hospital Medicine: A Practical Guide for Clinicians. Prior to joining the John Theurer Cancer Center faculty, Dr. Biran served as Chief Fellow of Hematology and Medical Oncology at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York. She also practiced in their internal medicine internship and residency and participated in numerous lecture series and training sessions for medical students, residents, and nurse practitioners. She received her medical degree from The George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

William Matsui, MD, is Deputy Director of the LIVESTRONG Cancer Institutes, Professor in the Department Oncology and Director of Hematological Malignancies Program at the Dell Medical School at the University of Texas at Austin. He specializes in caring for patients with cancers that involve the blood and bone marrow as well as bone marrow transplantation. He came to Austin from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, where he was a professor of oncology and served as the director of the Multiple Myeloma Program and the co-director of the Division of Hematologic Malignancies. Dr. Matsui has carried out laboratory-based translational research throughout his career and focused on studying cancer stem cells, tumor cells with enhanced growth potential and their role in clinical oncology. His laboratory first identified cancer stem cells in the plasma cell malignancy multiple myeloma in 2003 and subsequently in other cancers including lymphomas, leukemias and pancreas cancer. His laboratory has also demonstrated that several pathways regulating normal stem cells, including those involved in embryonic development, are abnormally activated in cancer stem cells. Dr. Matsui completed his residency training in internal medicine at the University of Washington in Seattle and his clinical training in medical oncology at Johns Hopkins. He earned his medical degree from the University of California at San Francisco.

Kenneth Shain, MD, PhD, is an Associate Member at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute (Moffitt), with a primary appointment in the Department of Malignant Hematology, and a secondary appointment in the Department of Tumor Biology. He also serves as Scientific Director of the Moffitt Myeloma Working Group (MMWG) and is Director of the ORIEN Multiple Myeloma Disease Interest Group (DIG) at Moffitt. Dr. Shain’s research focuses on the development of novel tools and resources to identify mechanisms of drug response, drug combination and personalized disease management. He treats myeloma patients and directs myeloma clinical trials. His research program addresses the critical need to identify vulnerabilities to inform the development of targeted therapies and create methods of truly personalized management in myeloma. Dr. Shain completed his postdoctoral fellowship in hematology and oncology at Moffitt and the University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa, FL. He served his medical residency and earned his MD and PhD at USF.