I am exploring what the consequences of including lymph node regions in radiotherapy treatments are on a patient's anti-tumour immune response, using translational samples from neo-adjuvant breast radiotherapy trials. This work ultimately aims to provide a clearer picture of how to best use radiotherapy in the era of immunotherapies for patients with early breast cancers. I'm training to be a clinical oncologist - we deliver all non-surgical treatments for cancer including radiotherapy, chemotherapy, targeted drug therapies and immunotherapy.
Outside work I enjoy walks, chess and cooking.
Among patients with recurrent and metastatic head and neck cancers, only 20% experience durable response on immunotherapy. This reflects the need to identify new ways to maximise the benefit of treatment for those patients who relapse early, and an in vivo early response biomarker could identify patients whose treatment could be escalated. In this PhD project, I will be studying different liquid biopsy approaches to establish a biomarker for dynamic response assessment in advanced head and neck cancer patients receiving immunotherapy. The ultimate aim is developing strategies that could be tested in clinical trials to better tailor treatment for our patients.
I had lived on 3 different continents by the age of 30.