Brian Wolpin, MD, MPH
Brian Wolpin, MD, MPH, has been named the new Director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
Dr. Wolpin is Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and was appointed earlier this year as the Robert T. and Judith B. Hale Chair in Pancreatic Cancer at Dana-Farber. He has also served as Co-Director of the Pancreas and Biliary Tumor Center at Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women’s Cancer Center.
As Director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center, Dr. Wolpin will lead the Center in its delivery of high-quality clinical care and clinical research aimed at improving outcomes for patients with gastrointestinal cancers. He will also oversee the translational research programs that support those activities and will oversee the education mission of the Center, especially the training of the next generation of medical oncology fellows.
“I am extremely honored to serve as Director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center at Dana-Farber,” said Dr. Wolpin. “With an incredibly talented and dedicated team of researchers and clinicians, the Center is making ground-breaking discoveries while delivering cutting-edge, compassionate care to all patients with gastrointestinal cancers.”
Research Focus and Leadership Roles
Dr. Wolpin’s research group is focused on understanding the factors that promote the initiation and progression of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. These studies involve evaluation of blood-based circulating markers, germline alterations, and somatic alterations in hundreds to thousands of subjects. The near-term goals of this work are to translate cutting-edge laboratory science into approaches for early detection of pancreatic cancer and to develop new treatments for patients with this malignancy.
Dr. Wolpin holds several leadership positions nationally and internationally, including Chair of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Pancreatic Cancer Detection Consortium Steering Committee, Co-Principal Investigator of the NCI Pancreatic Cancer Cohort Consortium, Medical Oncology Study Chair for ALLIANCE A021501, and Chair of the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research Pancreatic Cancer Translational Research Initiative External Review Committee. ■
