Randall Kimple, Chairperson at the University of Rochester Medicine, shared on LinkedIn:
“August is National Immunization Awareness Month, and this one is personal for me.
A significant portion of my work has focused on HPV-related head and neck cancer – how these tumors behave, why they respond differently than other head and neck cancers, and how we might treat them effectively with less lasting toxicity. It has shaped much of my career, and I expect it will for the rest of it.
It is also a disease a vaccine can prevent.
HPV now causes the majority of oropharyngeal cancers in the United States, and incidence has been rising for years, particularly in men. Unlike most cancers I treat, we know the cause. We have a vaccine against it. Given on time – typically around ages 11 to 12 – it prevents the infections that lead to these cancers decades later.
Which means some of the most consequential cancer work in our region happens nowhere near our clinics. It happens in pediatric offices, family medicine practices, school-based health centers, and pharmacies across Rochester and the surrounding counties.
- The pediatrician who makes the recommendation clearly, without hedging.
- The nurse who has the conversation a third time with a hesitant parent.
- The public health teams working to close vaccination gaps in communities that have been underserved for far too long.
I will keep working on better treatments for the patients who develop these cancers. I would much rather we prevent them. To my colleagues in primary care and public health across UR Medicine and our region: thank you.
Prevention is cancer care, and yours is some of the most important work in it.”
You can also read Could the HPV Vaccine Save Your Life? on OncoDaily.
