South Carolina Oncology Society (SCOS) shared on LinkedIn:
“November is Stomach Cancer Awareness Month, and this month’s Oncology Leader Spotlight is Albert Craig Lockhart!
Dr. Lockhart is the Grace DeWolff Professor of Medicine, Director of the Division of Hematology/Oncology, and Associate Director for Clinical Sciences at Hollings Cancer Center, Medical University of South Carolina.
When he started in oncology 25 years ago, almost nobody was running gastric cancer trials. He helped build that work, and today it’s one of the busiest areas in oncology research.
SCOS is proud to celebrate his leadership in gastric cancer care, from new targeted therapies to helping high-risk patients get identified and followed earlier.
Thank you for connecting colleagues and caring for patients across South Carolina. Congratulations!”
What inspired you to pursue a career in oncology, and how did that path lead you toward gastric cancer care?
When asked this question by the South Carolina Oncology Society (SCOS), Albert Craig Lockhart shared:
“During my oncology rotations, I saw the role an oncologist plays on a patient’s care team. You’re seeing people at the worst time of their lives, sometimes on the worst day of their lives, and you realize how much that visit can matter. You can help them understand their diagnosis, guide them toward next steps in treatment, and talk honestly about what the outlook could be.
Oncologists have a huge role in how people feel about their cancer, their lives and their goals, and I wanted to have that kind of impact, hopefully in a good way.
When I started 25 years ago, I knew I wanted to work in the GI tract. There was a lot of interesting research in colorectal cancer and some in pancreatic cancer, but almost nobody was doing anything in gastric cancer. That gave me the chance to start running clinical trials in a space that wasn’t crowded and make an impact relatively early in my career.”
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