Yale Cancer Center is pleased to announce that Sanjay Aneja, MD, Ira Leeds, MD, FACS, FASCRS, and Shilpa Murthy, MD, MPH, have been selected to receive 2025 Pilot Awards for Research on Cancer Care Equity. Under the leadership of Tracy Battaglia, MD, MPH, professor of medicine (general medicine) and associate director of cancer equity, community outreach and engagement at Yale Cancer Center, these pilot awards are specifically designed to support innovative cancer research that aims to address known inequities in the ability to deliver state of the art care to everyone who needs it.
“In support of Yale Cancer Center’s unwavering commitment to ensuring equitable access to cancer care for all of our patients, I am thrilled that three exemplary projects were chosen through a competitive process that included input from several of our community advisors,” says Dr. Battaglia.
Aneja is an assistant professor of therapeutic radiology and his project “Towards Equitable AI Imaging Models in Oncology” is focused on prostate and breast cancers in elderly and minority populations. His collaborator is Ilana Richman, MD, MHS.
Leeds is an assistant professor of surgery (colon and rectal), and will focus his project “Assessing the Impact of Psychosocial Risks (SDoH) on Outcomes of Major Cancer Surgery” on gastrointestinal cancers along with Vipina Kuttichi Keloth, PhD.
Murthy, assistant professor of surgery (colon and rectal), will collaborate with Drs. Pamela Kunz, Rachel Greenup, Jennifer Marlon, Cynthia Brandt, Daniel Sarpong, Ansley Roche, and Ammanuel Taye, for her project “BRIDGE: Assessing Biobanking Representation, Integration and Diversifying Community Engagement to Transform Biobanking Participation in Connecticut.”