Gynecologic Oncology
Clinical discussions on gynecologic malignancies, surgical approaches, and multimodal treatment strategies.
Recent Discussions
Do you perform pap smears as part of the surveillance of patients with a history of cervical or vaginal cancers who had radiation as part of their treatment?
I personally do not routinely perform pap testing for patients with a prior history of cervical or vaginal cancer who have had prior radiation. The main driver for me in this decision is that the results we receive from Pap testing often show abnormalities that are not reflective of recurrence or de...
Are there any online or publicly available pelvic floor physical therapy resources you regularly use or offer to patients?
I really like Nicole Cozean’s PFPT videos on YouTube.
How would you manage recurrent endometrial cancer limited to pelvic and inguinal nodes in a patient with no previous radiation?
If it is a delayed recurrence, we usually treat nodal regions only (going one level above involvement) with IMRT and concurrent weekly cisplatinum chemotherapy with SIB boost to node followed by possible adjuvant chemo.
How are you approaching patient selection for relacorilant + nab-paclitaxel (ROSELLA) in platinum-resistant ovarian cancer?
Relacorilant + nab-paclitaxel is now FDA-approved as of March 2026 and NCCN-listed as a preferred regimen for platinum-resistant epithelial ovarian, fallopian tube, or primary peritoneal cancer, and notably does not require biomarker selection — making patient selection primarily based on clinical a...
Do you offer vaginal cuff brachy alone, vaginal cuff brachy and chemo, or WPRT for surgically staged IB grade 3 endometrial cancer?
All patients who have stage IBG3 fall into the GOG249 eligibility criteria. However, it is important to recognize that patients within this group have broadly varying risks. First of all, serous cancers (which have a greater propensity to spread intraperitoneally and may demand variant-specific appr...
Are maintenance therapies for ovarian cancer being held at your institution due to COVID-19?
Patient safety and health care worker safety are of the upmost importance for us. We are doing telehealth visits and able to deliver oral drugs to patient's homes. For infusion visits, those are being decided on a case by case basis, depending on the patient and their disease status.
What features would push you towards re-operation for completion staging vs observation for a premenopausal woman with stage II borderline tumor of the ovary with capsule rupture and no other evidence of gross residual disease?
I would only reoperate if there were a survival benefit, symptomatic benefit, or change in treatment regimen. From the description, it doesn't seem like this meets any of those criteria.
How would you proceed when a cervical cancer undergoing brachytherapy has exceeded the rectal dose but not met the target dose?
Rectal dose and target dose have range. Preferred rectal dose for D2cc < 65 Gy but can accept up to D2cc < 75 Gy, provided you understand expected risk of complications with increased dose. Preference would be to do hybrid applicator with 3D imaging to optimize HRCTV and OAR.
What are your top takeaways in Gyn Cancers from ASCO 2026?
For ASCO 2026 in the GYN world, from a radiation oncologist's point of view, there was confirmation of immunotherapy benefit in longer-term follow-up of previously reported landmark studies: NRG-GY018 study — adding pembro for advanced measurable endometrial cancer, reported by Eskander et al showe...
Which endometrial cancers do you choose to send POLE testing on, assuming you cannot check it on everyone?
This is a great question for two main reasons: Resource utilization What am I going to do with the data I would choose to send POLE testing on patients where you think the data might impact your care... the challenge with that is that we lack strong prospective data to support de-escalation. With th...