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Aparna Parikh: Diving into the challenges, considerations, and opportunities at HLTH2024

Collage photo of Aparna Parikh and Karin Tollefson

Oct 23, 2024, 15:42

Aparna Parikh: Diving into the challenges, considerations, and opportunities at HLTH2024

Aparna Parikh, Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Gastrointestinal Oncologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, shared a post by Karin Tollefson, Chief Oncology Medical Officer at Pfizer, on LinkedIn, adding:

“We’re seeing more and more younger patients coming through our doors with cancer diagnoses (especially colorectal cancer). It was an honor to discuss this reality this week at my first HLTH2024 alongside my fellow panelists, and dive into the challenges, considerations, and opportunities that will help us evolve together to meet this moment.

Thank you again to Brenton Fargnoli for fantastic moderation and to my co panelists for a great discussion.

If you’re inspired by our session, and curious how cancer care can meet this moment, explore our new approach to cancer at Mass General Cancer Center.”

Quoting Karin Tollefson‘s post:

“I joined a panel at HLTH2024 alongside Brenton Fargnoli, Harlan Levine, Aparna Parikh and Tomasz (Tom) Beer to talk about the rise in early-onset cancers, defined as cancer cases diagnosed in people under 50.

We discussed this concerning trajectory, which is evident across a number of cancers such as colorectal and breast, and how we can be doing more as a community to support young people with cancer, taking a holistic approach that considers their unique needs. We also spoke about the collaboration required to ensure this demographic can benefit equally from early detection and innovation, including overcoming barriers such as access to earlier screening and molecular testing.

At Pfizer, we recognize cancer is one of the most challenging health crises of our time. Nothing is more urgent, or more personal, than our shared goal to outmaneuver cancer, so we don’t reverse decades of public health progress in this space.”

Aparna Parikh

Aparna Raj Parikh is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and a Gastrointestinal Oncologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, where she has been practicing since September 2016. She is affiliated with the Tucker Gosnell Center for Gastrointestinal Cancers and the Henri and Belinda Termeer Center for Targeted Therapies.

Dr. Parikh’s clinical interests include clinical trials, clinical research, gastrointestinal cancer, global health, immunotherapy, and Phase I clinical trials.