One of the things I love most is being able to sing my patients to sleep.

Thank you, Fierce Pharma!

I always love talking about WISDOM!

Trials need to look more like care, and care needs to look more like trials.

I had an amazing time at the Sir Peter Freyer Surgical Symposium, and was honored to be the 50th Freyer lecturer.

Thanks, SABCSG!

@cbseveningnews.bsky.social spotlight on @drlauraesserman.bsky.social @ucsfhealth.bsky.social making the operating room more comfortable for patients. youtu.be/U6Jo91hYn4U?...

I had a great time in Adelaide! Personalized medicine is the future, and the future is here.

Lots of great work to do!

Lots of fun and great ideas at Grand Rounds at UCLA.

Coming up—looking forward to it!

Big kudos to ACOG.

We improve the field by finding and fixing disparities that lead to poor outcomes.

Important ILC I-SPY paper.

New I-SPY paper!

Cancer care requires a precise set of data that is available to and used by clinicians.

Join us at Rise Up in February to discuss these and other important topics!

Great new paper from Kim Badal!

News to come!

Join us in redefining the priorities for women’s health!

An important publication showing that endocrine therapy is the most important long-term intervention to reduce the risk of developing invasive breast cancer.

An important step on the road to personalizing treatments for women with breast cancer!

The future of women’s health is here.

Big kudos to the Canadian Cancer Society for funding this critically important study, and to the CHALLENGE investigators for carrying it out.

Sparking Innovation in Healthcare Value—always inspiring!

It is a relief that someone said it, "how have we fallen so low?" www.ifyoucankeepit.org/p/breaking-n...

Judy Boughey's presidential address highlighted how important innovative trial design is for moving the field forward and talked about I SPY 2.2.- even though it is more complex, it is a wonderful way to treat patients

Mandeep Kaur presenting on the disparity in the use of axillary dissection by race at ASBrS 2025

Julie van Hassel (award for best trainee) presented on the time to surgery after neoadjuvant chemo and impact on outcomes (In the setting of excellent response, time is not important, but in setting of residual disease, > 9 weeks is associated with worse outcome)

Rita Mukhtar and down staging of the axilla in lobular vs. ductal on I SPY at ASBrS 2025

As the federal government plans to cut billions of dollars of NIH funding to universities, Ryan is speaking up. "Funding medical research is about more than just numbers. It’s real people,” he says. Read Ryan's story: www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/facing-...

Of 356 FDA-approved medicines developed from 2010 to 2019, 99.4% were funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This includes dozens of studies into spinal muscular atrophy, which has impacted UC Berkeley graduate student Ryan Manriquez since childhood.

We should be harnessing the imagination and resourcefulness of our healthcare workforce to improve what we do in healthcare.

An example of this is breast cancer screening. This one screening measure can cost $12 billion and, depending on which guideline you follow, could be up to $30 billion. Investing in better models to identify those who benefit most from screening will lead to better outcomes while decreasing costs.

Innovative companies spend between 10%-30% of their profits on R&D. Our healthcare delivery budget in the US is $5 trillion. We should be investing in research and finding innovative ways to deliver better products at a lesser cost with less patient burdens (healthcare value).

If we crush our infrastructure, fail to have a reliable process for drug reviews and approval, and discourage innovation, this industry will go elsewhere outside the United States. That does not seem to be in anybody’s best interest.

We are at the top of this field because of the exciting opportunities to study, innovate, and create new companies. This is an important business sector that helps to save lives and provides important services and many jobs.

The advances in science in the last decade and especially the last 5 years lay the groundwork for an unprecedented opportunity to personalize medicine. This is not the time to take our foot off the pedal. abc7news.com/amp/post/fed...

If you are suffering from hot flashes and you have not had a period for 6 months and especially if you think you are at an elevated risk for breast cancer we have the perfect trial for you. We are studying Duavee that is a combination of drugs. One is a potent SERM and the other which is estrogen.

This paper is so important and shows how different approaches to screening can change the cost by 20 billion dollars. Being more targeted does just as much good and avoids screening burdens and extra costs for women. bmjopen.bmj.com/content/15/2...

I want to say congratulations to Joelle for articulating how she managed a challenging time in her life and made something negative into something positive. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNlQ...

Congratulation to Kim Badal and team for publishing a study on the huge variation in screening costs across guidelines pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39961709/ BMJ just put this manuscript online showing the impact of varying screening guidelines on the overall cost of breast cancer screening in the US.

WISDOM is proud to spotlight our amazing leaders and pioneers who are constantly innovating the field of breast cancer research. On December 11th, WISDOM's Laura J. van ‘t Veer, PhD was rewarded with the 2024 William L. McGuire Memorial Lecture Award. Photo by © MedMeetingImages/Todd Buchanan

My hope for the new year is that we will redouble our efforts to make sure that reproductive freedom is accessible to all women, we work to eliminate preventable deaths in young women, and we celebrate all those whose lives have been devoted to service to others.

I was inspired by the celebration of Barbara Lee’s 26 years of service and all that she’s accomplished because of her commitment to doing what is right and her persistence in demanding fairness and equity. Here is someone that truly speaks truth to power. Proud to be a huge supporter.

We have proof of concept that intratumoral immunotherapy combinations can reverse high risk ductal carcinoma in situ. Now we have to find a partner to develop long lasting solutions as an alternative to surgery. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39821301/

“We have this mentality in this country that being aggressive surgically and fighting the cancer is the best thing, but a lot of the time it’s not” @drlauraesserman.bsky.social @ucsfhealth.bsky.social

RISE UP taught us that BZA is perhaps one of the best agents to target endocrine positive tumors. We are really excited to be participating in a trial that is testing to see if BZA combined with a small amount of estrogen can be risk-reducing and at the same time relieve women of hot flashes.

The goal of screening is good, but screening has fallen short in a number of different ways. It's not good at finding fast-growing, aggressive cancers early which is why women need to call attention if they feel a new mass, even if they've had a recent normal mammogram.

For 30 years the standard of care for DCIS was surgery. Now, active surveillance may be an option with medications that can reduce your risk. If you’ve had a recently had a diagnosis and would like to join the study, learn more about the RECAST study here: clinicaltrials.ucsf.edu/trial/NCT060...