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Diversity in Clinical Trials

This webinar can be found in the ASTRO Academy considered barriers to clinical trial enrollment, including trial design, inclusion/exclusion criteria, language barriers, financial toxicity and how organizations are working to increase enrollment of patients from diverse communities.

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Chika Madu, MD
Northwell Health
Host

Chika Madu, MD, is the Chair of the Department of Radiation Medicine at Staten Island University Hospital (SIUH) / Northwell Health. She serves as the Chair of the Commission on Cancer at SIUH, as well as the Chair of the Quality Assurance Committee in Radiation Medicine at SIUH. She is the vice-chair of the Advocacy Committee of ASTRO’s Health Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (HEDI) Council. She serves on the SIUH Women in Medicine Executive Committee. She is an alumna of Northwell Health’s Physician Leadership Development Program, the MAP-IT Program, and the Northwell/Cornell Executive Leadership Development Program. She earned her medical degree at the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor and completed her residency training in radiation oncology at the University of Pennsylvania’s Abramson Cancer Center. She is a firm believer in multidisciplinary patient care and ensures collaboration with other physicians from other departments in order to improve treatment outcomes for cancer patients. Dr. Madu plays an active role in medical student and resident education, mentorship, research, and the development of strategies aimed at eliminating health care disparities for all patients. She has been an invited lecturer at National / Regional Oncology Conferences. She is a member of several professional societies including The American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO), American Society for Clinical Oncology (ASCO), American Radium Society (ARS), and the American Board of Radiology (ABR).
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Rosalyn Morrell, MD
CenterPoint Radiation Oncology
Host

Rosalyn Morrell, MD, is recognized by her patients and peers as one of the best board-certified radiation oncologists in the Los Angeles area. Dr. Morrell received her medical degree and radiation oncology training at the University of Arizona and completed a fellowship for head and neck cancers at the Mayo Clinic. She has extensive experience treating all types of cancer including, breast, prostate, gynecologic, lung, skin, head-and-neck, as well as many other cancers. Dr. Morrell is an expert in the most advanced radiotherapy techniques, including intensity modulated radiation therapy (IMRT), stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT), stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS), volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT), 3-D conformal radiation, image-guided radiation, as well as HDR brachytherapy for breast and gynecological cancer. She is published in numerous peer journals, including the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Oncology Times, Practical Radiation Oncology and Mayo Clinic Proceedings. She is a contributing author of the book, Made For More – Physician Entrepreneurs Who Live Life and Practice Medicine On Their Own Terms. She is also a frequent lecturer and speaker – sharing her expertise about cancer diagnosis, treatment, and survivorship. She has chaired hospital cancer committees and tumor boards, and she is proud of her volunteer work focused on reducing cancer health disparities in vulnerable populations. Successfully treating cancer for over 15 years, Dr. Morrell has been selected for the Los Angeles Castle Connolly Top Doctors list since 2017 and has been named one of Southern California’s SuperDoctors® from 2016 through 2023.
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Chanita Hughes-Halbert, PhD
MUSC
Panelist

Chanita Hughes-Halbert, PhD, oversees a research program at MUSC. Its goal is to improve the precision of multilevel strategies for achieving health equity by identifying diverse determinants of minority health and cancer health disparities and by translating this information into sustainable interventions in clinic and community-based settings, ultimately to improve cancer outcomes and chronic disease management in disparity populations in local and regional geographic areas. Dr. Hughes-Halbert is a nationally recognized expert in cancer prevention and control among diverse populations and her research is supported by numerous grants from the National Cancer Institute, the National Institutes on Minority Health and Health Disparities and the Veteran’s Affairs Medicine Center. Previously, she was a member of the Board of Scientific Advisors at the National Cancer Institute and the National Human Genome Research Institute Advisory Council. Dr. Hughes-Halbert is a past recipient of the AACR Distinguished Lecture in Cancer Health Disparities Award and is a member of the National Academy of Medicine
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Mitchell Machtay, MD, FASTRO
Penn State Hershey Medical Center
Panelist

Mitchell Machtay, MD, FASTRO,  is currently the Associate Cancer Center Director at the Penn State Cancer Institute, based in Hershey, Pennsylvania; he is also the Penn State College of Medicine’s Associate Dean for Clinical Cancer Research and a tenured Professor of Radiation Oncology. Dr. Machtay's undergraduate training was in chemical engineering at Princeton and then the NYU School of Medicine before his residency in radiation oncology at the University of Pennsylvania. He is an academic oncologist, board certified in radiation oncology, who has dedicated his professional life to advancing the treatment of locally advanced solid malignant tumors. He has made significant contributions in clinical care, research and teaching, including multiple years’ receiving ARRO educator of the year recognition and holding multiple grants and contracts from NCI and other sponsors. His primary interest is in combined modality therapy using advanced radiation technology and novel systemic therapies for several types of cancers, particularly lung cancer, head and neck cancer, and CNS tumors. For example, he was one of the first investigators to study research trials combining taxane chemotherapy with radiation for head and neck and lung cancer. Overall, he has managed as PI/co-PI or as key personnel over 50 investigator initiated prospective clinical trials and contributed to over 100 cooperative group trials. In addition to his pure clinical research, he performs translational work, collaborating with basic scientists to validate biomarkers, identify new combinations of anti-cancer therapies and inform clinical research.

Dr. Machtay has spearheaded many national clinical trials and has held increasing leadership roles in the U.S. cooperative group system (now the National Clinical Trials Network). Most notably he is the Deputy Chair for Research and Chief Scientific Officer for the NRG Oncology Group, which has an active portfolio of over 40 accruing studies and annual budget of over $17M. He directs NRG protocol development and conduct for the Group, which primarily performs late stage Phase II and III trials, with the mission of setting the standards of care for cancer management in solid tumors. NRG also performs selected early phase work in conjunction with NCI/CTEP, quality-of-life work as part of the DCP/NCORP network, biomarker research, and ancillary/secondary data analytics. Dr. Machtay is also the President of the non-profit Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) Foundation, which operates national trials outside of the NCI system, with a similar role in RTOG to his role in NRG. In these positions, he participates actively in all the disease-site and modality committees of the organization.

At Penn State, Mitch leads all aspects of cancer clinical research, including the Penn State Cancer Institute’s Clinical Trials Office. He coordinates efforts among many departments in the College of Medicine and Penn State Health to ensure the institution offers the greatest breadth and quality of clinical research to the Central Pennsylvania community.

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Jennifer Wenzel, PhD
Johns Hopkins School of Nursing
Panelist

Jennifer Wenzel, PhD, is an Associate Professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing and the School of Medicine, Oncology. She directs the JHU SON PhD and Postdoctoral fellows program and serves on the Advisory Council for the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the JHU SON. The significance of Dr. Wenzel’s research has been recognized through prestigious early career faculty awards from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the American Cancer Society. Working with interdisciplinary teams from the JHU Schools of Medicine and Public Health, she has led multi-institutional interventions to improve collaborative cancer-related decision-making and treatment for patients and care partners through innovative and supportive interventions. Currently, she is funded by MetaVivor Foundation to pilot a palliative decision support intervention for Black women and their decision partners. Dr. Wenzel leads diversity efforts in research and provider education, including serving as CoPI of a Pathways to PhD for Nursing Scholars program funded by Johns Hopkins University, as a means to achieve health equity. Further, she co-chairs the Health Disparities Committee for NRG Oncology and serves as the Health Disparities Special Expert for the SxQoL Steering Committee for NCI.
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