Newswise — An expert panel on women’s cancers and human papillomavirus (HPV) will assemble at The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center on October 20, 2017. The panel will give remarks and answer questions on women’s cancers, HPV and their impact worldwide. The panel features Shobha S. Krishnan, MD, FAAFP, a guest lecturer invited to the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center panel, and UNM Cancer Center faculty members Carolyn Y. Muller, MD, FACOG, and Cosette M. Wheeler, PhD.
Krishnan is President and Founder of Global Initiative Against HPV and Cervical Cancer. She is a board-certified family physician and gynecologist and an international expert on HPV. Muller is a board-certified gynecologic oncologist. She serves as Director of the newly-opened UNM Women’s Cancers Center at the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center. Wheeler is a UNM Regents’ Professor and an international expert on HPV. She serves as UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center Special Populations Distinguished Staff Investigator.
HPV can cause several types of cancer. According to the National Cancer Institute, HPV causes almost all the cases of cervical cancer, about 95 percent of anal cancers, more than 90 percent of vaginal cancers, about 70 percent of mouth and throat cancers, and about 65 percent of vulvar cancers in the United States. Worldwide, HPV-related cervical cancers claimed the lives of more than 266,000 women in 2012, the latest year for which data are available.
The expert panel will discuss these statistics and the tools doctors have today to combat these cancers. In a lecture following the panel, Krishnan will focus on preventing HPV-related diseases and present science, data and personal stories.
About the Women’s Cancer Panel and Dr. Krishnan’s Lecture
The UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center is pleased to host a Women’s Cancer Panel and Lecture featuring Shobha S. Krishnan, MD, FAAFP. The event will take place on Friday, October 20, 2017, in The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center Auditorium, 1201 Camino de Salud, Albuquerque, NM 87106. The panel will convene at 10:00 am. Dr. Krishnan’s lecture begins at 12:00 noon. The event is free and open to the public. Admission may be limited due to space.
About Carolyn Y. Muller, MD, FACOG
Carolyn Muller, MD, is a tenured Professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine and is the Director of its Division of Gynecologic Oncology. She is also Director of the UNM Women’s Cancers Center and Chief of the Gynecologic Cancer Clinical Working Group. She is an active member on several NCI committees that review and approve national clinical trials in gynecologic cancers. Dr. Muller received her MD from the University of Pennsylvania. Following graduation, she completed her residency in Gynecology and Obstetrics at Pennsylvania Hospital in 1992. She completed a Gynecologic Oncology fellowship at UT Southwestern Medical Center in 1996 and continued with a postdoctoral fellowship in Molecular Biology as an Assistant Professor. She joined UNM in 2004.
About Cosette M. Wheeler, PhD
Cosette Wheeler, PhD is a UNM Regents Professor in the Departments of Pathology and Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center. She holds the Victor and Ruby Hansen Surface Endowed Chair in Translational Medicine and Public Health. Her New Mexico research group has contributed for over 25 years to understanding the molecular epidemiology of human papillomaviruses (HPV) in cervical precancer and cancer among Native American, Hispanic and non-Hispanic women of the southwest and on a global basis. She has overseen a number of large-scale multidisciplinary population-based projects that have ultimately enabled advances in primary (HPV vaccines) and secondary cervical cancer prevention (Pap and HPV tests). Dr. Wheeler has authored over 200 peer-reviewed articles in a number in top tier journals.
About Shobha S. Krishnan, MD, FAAFP
Dr. Krishnan, a board-certified family physician and gynecologist, is the author of the national and international award-winning book, The HPV Vaccine Controversy: Sex, Cancer, God and Politics (Praeger 2008). Dr. Krishnan is a member on the expert’s panel of the American Sexual Health Association, Medical Advisory Board of the National Cervical Cancer Coalition and has served on the STD research-working group at Columbia University and as a surveillance physician for the Centers for Disease Control. Dr. Krishnan completed her medical and post-graduate training in India and her residency in Indianapolis, Indiana. She also had a graduate certificate in non-profit leadership and management from the University of Florida.
About the UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center
The University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center is the Official Cancer Center of New Mexico and the only National Cancer Institute-designated Cancer Center in a 500-mile radius. Its 125 board-certified oncology specialty physicians include cancer surgeons in every specialty (abdominal, thoracic, bone and soft tissue, neurosurgery, genitourinary, gynecology, and head and neck cancers), adult and pediatric hematologists/medical oncologists, gynecologic oncologists, and radiation oncologists. They, along with more than 500 other cancer healthcare professionals (nurses, pharmacists, nutritionists, navigators, psychologists and social workers), provided cancer care for nearly 60 percent of the adults and children in New Mexico affected by cancer. They treated 11,249 patients in 84,875 ambulatory clinic visits in addition to in-patient hospitalizations at UNM Hospital. These patients came from every county in the State. More than 12 percent of these patients participated in cancer clinical trials testing new cancer treatments and 35 percent of patients participated in other clinical research studies, including tests of novel cancer prevention strategies and cancer genome sequencing. The 130 cancer research scientists affiliated with the UNMCCC were awarded almost $60 million in federal and private grants and contracts for cancer research projects and published 301 high quality publications. Promoting economic development, they filed more than 30 new patents in FY16, and since 2010, have launched 11 new biotechnology start-up companies. Scientists associated with the UNMCCC Cancer Control & Disparities have conducted more than 60 statewide community-based cancer education, prevention, screening, and behavioral intervention studies involving more than 10,000 New Mexicans. Finally, the physicians, scientists and staff have provided education and training experiences to more than 230 high school, undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral fellowship students in cancer research and cancer health care delivery. Learn more at www.cancer.unm.edu.