Isil Yildiz-Aktas, MD, MPH, Assistant Professor of Pathology at Yale School of Medicine and an Affiliated Faculty of the Yale Institute for Global Health, has been selected as an American Society of Cytopathology (ASC) Partners/BIO Ventures for Global Health (BVGH) 2023 Global Health Ambassador.
Since 2017, through the African Access Initiative, BVGH has partnered with experts and key opinion leaders from industry, academia, governments, and NGOs to target the growing cancer crisis in Africa.
The crisis can be attributed to many complex and connected factors, including but not limited to delayed and/or incomplete diagnoses. Much of sub-Saharan Africa lacks the diagnostic pathology capacity to needed accurately diagnose and stage cancers to ensure appropriate treatments are prescribed. Patients suffer delays due to the lack of efficient and reliable pathology services, leading to poor outcomes.
Dr. Yildiz-Aktas, a cytopathologist and a general surgical pathologist whose interests include quality in healthcare and digital pathology, said she looks forward to the challenge.
“I have always been interested in doing meaningful and impactful work and serving the big picture,” she said. “That interest and purpose led me into getting a master’s in public health and becoming a cytopathologist and getting trained on performing ultrasound guided fine needle aspirations. All of which, in my opinion, serve the purpose of cancer screening, early diagnosis, and prevention. I am thrilled to have found an opportunity to realize these goals. I am really honored to be selected.”