Bruce Cheson: Revolutionizing the Field of Hematology

• RSS
• Print

Bruce Cheson, MD, has a few goals in life: Keep cycling, continue playing in his rock band, and enjoy the hectic life of an attending physician in Lombardi’s adult hematology clinic. In addition, he says, he is going to revolutionize the field of hematology.

This is no idle threat. Cheson is head of the hematology division at Georgetown’s Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center and has a research and clinical track record that shows he can back it up.

Leading an international team of cancer specialists and imaging experts, Cheson has developed standardized guidelines for assessing how lymphomas respond to treatment. The guidelines, released in February 2007, provide clinicians worldwide with consistent criteria to compare and interpret clinical trials of lymphoma treatments and will facilitate the development of new therapies.

“The overall goal is to improve therapies for patients with lymphoma,” explains Cheson.

Lymphoma is the most common blood cancer and the third most-common cancer in childhood. At Lombardi, Cheson and his team of hematology physicians and nurses treat more than 2,500 patients every year.

One of his recent projects – in addition to seeing patients in the clinic and conducting his own clinical research – is the annual Lymphoma Research Ride. The ride, which he helped found in 2006, brings together survivors, caregivers, individuals, and community and corporate teams who ride in honor of thousands of patients and caregivers. Proceeds benefit the Lymphoma Research Foundation, which offers funding for lymphoma research and provides patients and health care professionals with critical information about the disease.

Cheson and his wife Christine help organize the event in honor and in memory of those whose lives have been touched by lymphoma.

“I decided to organize the ride to show that, with lymphoma, life can go on,” says Cheson. “And with the ride we can raise money to help find a cure.”

His own search for the cure is focused on the incredible potential of biologic therapies. In clinical trials, Cheson is studying a combination therapy of biological agents as an alternative to chemotherapy. These agents include antibodies and anti-sense drugs that together can target and shut down oncogenes in a cancer cell.

“There is a growing number of active biological therapies and a growing number of patients who can’t tolerate chemotherapy,” he says. “For some diseases, the combination of biological agents has been shown to be at least as effective as non-specific chemotherapy. But it has the added advantage that the treatment is specific and only targets the cancer cells, so we see fewer toxic effects.”

Cheson’s vision includes not just advances in the field, but also training the next generation of hematology-oncology doctors to push the boundaries of what we know about treatment of cancer.

“When I started in medicine, there was no drug that worked for patients with leukemia or lymphoma,” he reflects. “Now we’re curing people, or prolonging survival with excellent quality of life. And that’s what we will continue to do.”

By Allison Whitney, Lombardi Communications