Breakthroughs in the Battle Against Cancer with Tyler Jacks, MD
This week, explore the world of cutting-edge cancer research with Doro, Tricia, and guest Tyler Jacks, MD, President of Break Through Cancer. Together, they discuss the organization's patient-centric approach and the proactive ways Break Through Cancer is propelling scientific breakthroughs.
Dr. Jacks shares innovative approaches to early-stage cancer prevention and the discoveries Break Through Cancer has made in pancreatic cancer, glioblastoma, ovarian cancer, and more. Throughout the conversation, experience the passion and hope for a cancer-free future.
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Website: https://breakthroughcancer.org/
X | Twitter: https://twitter.com/break_cancer
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/break-through-cancer
Quotes:
We're hopeful that we can make a difference and change what are now challenging diagnoses to manageable diseases and even diseases we can cure. - Tyler Jacks, MD
We are creating a new approach to cancer research that emphasizes bringing individual researchers together into teams to do things that they couldn't do working as individuals. - Tyler Jacks, MD
There's a very clear emergence of the role of the immune system in recognizing and effectively treating cancer. - Tyler Jacks, MD
Show Notes:
TYLER JACKS: I would say ours is very much of a patient focused organization. We have seven disease teams. Each of those disease teams has a clinical trial that's either already ongoing as a function of our funding, or has a clinical trial in the works and will be launched in the next several months. So this is not basic research for the sake of knowledge generation, although that is certainly important. It is research geared towards getting the discoveries to patients and to patient testing as rapidly as possible. You want to make good choices because you want the best treatments to be available to patients, not just any treatment, just to say that you did a clinical trial. But we are funding very sort of cutting edge work where we feel very good about the fact that it's being tested in patients. So that is very critical to the mission of breakthrough cancer. It's a patient focused organization that also believes in the power of science.
TRICIA REILLY KOCH: I think that's right. Like something has to be done differently. And it sounds like the egos and all the things with the different hospitals is something you're saying isn't an issue. Now, have you guys figured that out?
TYLER JACKS: It's a dangerous question you've just asked me. We've recognized as an organization, I think everybody quite recognizes that individuals have allegiances to their laboratories, to their institutions, to their careers, and all of those are understandable. This approach really does require you, as a funded investigator on one of our teams, to prioritize the project first. It's about the science. It's about the science to the patient. And while those other things are important and we can't deny that they're important. To my mind, they come second to what we're trying to do here. And that does require a little bit of subjugation, of ego and allegiance and so forth. So I don't think it's a problem to say it out loud. I think it's important.
TRICIA REILLY KOCH: And especially given the economics of hospitals right now, I mean, it's tough, right? I mean, it is not an easy time both that way and also the job is so demanding.
TYLER JACKS: Yeah, I agree with you and the institutions with which they work. These are hospitals, mostly MIT. We don't have a cancer hospital, but these are challenging times and they are investing a lot of their personnel, resources and other resources in making this work. So I give them a great deal of credit, actually, for participating at that level. And the people that we fund are some of the busiest people you'll ever meet, and we need them to stay focused on the mission at hand. And sometimes that's easier than others. But we have a tremendous cadre of people that we work with. I'll just you didn't ask me this, but I'll just say that one thing that we've noticed and we're really encouraged by is that some of our more junior investigators, so younger scientists are the most engaged. They are the ones who really maybe they have more time to commit, but they also have an ethos that is consistent with the importance of what we're trying to do together, as opposed to what's going to necessarily benefit me as an individual. And that's really quite reassuring to see.
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