This week Bobbi Conner talks with Dr. William Hawkins about pancreatic cancer research. Dr. Hawkins is a surgical oncologist and pancreatic cancer researcher and he’s Deputy Director of MUSC Hollings Cancer Center.
TRANSCRIPT:
Conner: I'm Bobbi Conner for South Carolina Public Radio with Health Focus here at the radio studio for the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. Research is underway worldwide and in South Carolina to better understand how to prevent, detect, and treat pancreatic cancer. Doctor William Hawkins is here to provide an update about research related to this type of cancer. Doctor Hawkins is a surgical oncologist and pancreatic cancer researcher, and he's Deputy Director of MUSC Hollings Cancer Center. Doctor Hawkins I understand researchers now know that pancreatic cancer takes years to develop. Is there anything new related to possible early detection or screening for people who may have pancreatic cancer?
Dr. Hawkins: So, there's a lot of new things being developed to try and detect and screen for pancreatic cancer. These are still at the research stage. They're not available to the general public. But for those patients who we know have very high risk for pancreatic cancer, there are some screening programs and even some prevention trials underway.
Conner: And what about people that are at significantly increased risk of pancreatic cancer? What is known about that group of people or what can be done?
Dr. Hawkins: Folks who have multiple relatives with pancreatic cancer, folks who have underlying genetic abnormalities that put them at risk for pancreatic cancer, and particularly the group that has both of those things. Those are the people we're studying now and are entering trials in prevention of pancreatic cancer.
Conner: Why is pancreatic cancer such a challenging disease?
Dr. Hawkins: We've been working on this question for almost 20 years, and we keep finding new reasons. But it is really interesting that pancreatic cancer develops in an environment where it learns to suppress the immune system. So, the drugs that work for other diseases, the immune stimulating drugs, haven't really worked at all in pancreatic cancer. But we're learning why those reasons exist. There is significant improvement in understanding the basic biology of pancreatic cancer. What are the risk factors for pancreatic cancer and how these contribute to the progression of disease? And there's great progress being made in developing new treatments for pancreatic cancer. There's also some treatments for the underlying genetic disorders that drive pancreatic cancer. We now have several medications in national clinical trials to try to inhibit the driving mutation of pancreatic cancer. So, lots of progress on the horizon.
Conner: And tell us about research underway at MUSC that's related to pancreatic cancer.
Dr. Hawkins: So, we have a very robust team here working on pancreatic cancer. We have some scientists working on the genetic mutation called KRAS, which drives pancreatic cancer and developing inhibitors against that. We have immunologists such as myself working on personalized vaccines and other treatments towards pancreatic cancer. And, we're working on some new clinical trials that integrate these things to better treat patients.
Conner: Doctor Hawkins, what can individuals do to possibly reduce their risk of getting pancreatic cancer?
Dr. Hawkins: Pancreatic cancer is a difficult disease to prevent and cure. It's hard to detect. We have a lot of work yet to be done. The two things that we have control over are not smoking and taking good care of ourselves, including eating right, because obesity is another factor that we're learning, drives both pancreatic cancer as well as other cancers.
Conner: Doctor Hawkins, thanks for this information about research related to pancreatic cancer.
Dr. Hawkins: It's my pleasure. You're welcome.
Conner: From the radio studio for the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, I'm Bobbi Conner for South Carolina Public Radio.
Health Focus transcripts are intended to accurately represent the original audio version of the program; however, some discrepancies or inaccuracies may exist. The audio format serves as the official record of Health Focus programming.
