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Patterns have long fascinated Ann LaCasce, MD, who cares for patients with lymphoma.
Blending science and care
The Institute's commitment to helping deliver laboratory discoveries to patients was one of the big draws for Ann LaCasce, MD, who treats patients with lymphoma at DFCI and partnering Brigham and Women's Hospital. Some receive standard treatments, while others are on clinical trials for experimental drugs. She also collaborates with senior faculty studying these cancers of the lymphatic system.
"There are many types of lymphoma," LaCasce reflects. "We're learning more about how they differ on a molecular and genetic level so we can target them in our treatments in a less toxic way than in the past."
LaCasce was always fascinated by medicine, but spent five years in the retail art world before enrolling at Tufts Medical School. A professor there inspired her to go into hematology, and she started a DFCI fellowship in 1999. "This teacher was so competent in her ability to make the science interesting and exciting, and she cared deeply about her patients," LaCasce recalls. "As a clinical investigator, you do both of these things: patient care and research."
Pediatric oncologist David Pellman, MD, concurs that patient interaction is a major part of this specialty where treatment can take months or years. "You see your patients in the Jimmy Fund Clinic every week, and you become part of their families," he says. " You have an incredibly deep connection with them." Pellman chose Dana-Farber because of its reputation as an excellent place to train, as did his junior colleague Suneet Agarwal, MD, PhD, a first-year fellow in pediatric oncology. Both point to the remarkable scientific advances made over the past few decades in childhood cancer, many of them led by DFCI. "Being here," says Agarwal, "you have the ability to make discoveries that will have a lasting impact."
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