Symposium at Asan Medical Center covers cutting-edge advances in cancer management and prevention

Together with HMI, Asan Medical Center (AMC) and the University of Ulsan College of Medicine hosted “New Frontiers of Oncology,” the fifth biennial international symposium held in a decade-long series focused on cutting-edge medical research. A highlight of one of HMI’s oldest partnerships, the two-day educational event was held in Seoul, Korea on June 23-24. It was attended by a wide range of international academic and private physicians and researchers, and featured presentations and panel discussions by leading experts in the field on the most current clinical and technological advances in cancer research and treatment.

HMI’s Tom Aretz spoke at the symposium.

“The theme fit extremely well with Asan Medical Center’s strategic objective of enhancing its comprehensive cancer care center and continuing its role as a leader in health care in Korea and the region,” said Tom Aretz, MD, vice president for Global Programs at HMI and associate professor of pathology at Harvard Medical School. “A symposium that addresses cancer from underlying mechanisms, prevention strategies, early diagnosis, and multidisciplinary treatment is timely and critical for reducing cancer deaths and for creating more productive lives for those afflicted, bringing science to the bedside as rapidly and safely as possible.”

A multidisciplinary faculty from leading U.S. academic medical institutions including Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), and Korea’s Asan Medical Center and the Ulsan College of Medicine, contributed talks examining the prevention, screening, evaluation, and management of cancers.

Opening the first main plenary session of the symposium, Joo-Hyun Nam, MD, PhD, of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at University of Ulsan College of Medicine, described specific contributions that the field of epidemiology has made in the fight against cancer. He described significant epidemiologic findings that have made contributions to knowledge of cancer risk, morbidity and mortality, survival, trends over time, and disparities in cancer treatment and outcomes. In order to determine the current magnitude of the cancer burden, Nam asserted, cancer registration is essential to the planning and monitoring of a national cancer control program.

A session devoted to clinical research included a presentation titled “Recent Prostate Cancer Randomized Trials: Implications for Improving Prostate Cancer Detection and Treatment,” by Martin Sanda, MD, associate professor of surgery at BIDMC. Sanda discussed preliminary data from recent randomized trials suggesting new evidence for guiding detection and treatment for prostate cancer and providing insight regarding prostate cancer characteristics and severity. He emphasized the need for better screening tests and discussed questions surrounding the role of aggressive treatment in screened cases, as well as the need for studies to develop novel biomarkers.

Another highlight of this session, “Recent Advances in the Treatment of Stomach Cancer” by Yoon-Koo Kang, MD, PhD, of Asan Medical Center, pointed out that although the incidence of gastric cancer is decreasing in the West, it is still the most common cancer in Korea and the second most common cancer throughout the world. Kang’s presentation examined recent advances in early diagnosis and surgery, and the development of new chemotherapeutic agents that are helping to improve the prognosis of gastric cancer.

From left to right: Fumio Konishi, professor and chairman of the Department of Surgery, Jichi Medical School; Jin Cheon Kim, professor of surgery and director of the Asan Medical Center Institute for Life Sciences; and Kun-Choon Park, president of Asan Medical Center.

During the second session of the symposium to focus on new advances in clinical research, Barbara Smith, MD, PhD, assistant professor of surgery at MGH, presented “Advances in Surgery and Radiation for Breast Cancer.” She spoke about technical improvements in lumpectomy and radiation techniques and their role in reducing local recurrence rates, further reducing the relative benefit of mastectomy. Smith reviewed results of recent studies aimed at further reducing the extent of surgery and radiation for breast cancer as well as studies on lumpectomy without radiation for older patients. She also discussed advances in sentinel node biopsy techniques and alternatives to axillary dissection for patients with positive sentinel nodes. Smith also addressed the reality that despite improvements in breast conservation techniques, some patients still require or prefer mastectomy.

The previous four symposia in this series have been recognized internationally for their educational contributions, and the proceedings of the second and third symposia have been published in peer-reviewed U.S. journals. The topics have included “Cerebral Ischemia: Basic Mechanisms and Clinical Aspects” (1997); “Scientific Integration of Western Medicine and Complementary/Alternative Medicine-Mind/Body Medicine” (1999); “Genomics and Proteomics: Impact on Medicine and Health” (2001); and “Nanotechnology in Biology and Medicine” (2004).

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