Chapter 16: Building Excellence and Therapeutic Promise
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Description
In this Chapter, Dr. Pollock reviews the contributions he feels he has made to MD Anderson and to his field, and also notes the projects he wishes he could have brought to completion. Beginning with his clinical work, he is very gratified that he worked with the Department Chairs to assemble a group of surgeons who are not only the best in the world but can “sublimate their egos” and work together toward larger initiatives, including a very successful research program.
Dr. Pollock notes that he had wanted to shepherd some sections (orthopedics, ophthalmology, dental oncology) to becoming separate departments, but was unable to complete that. He is pleased that tele-surgery initiatives were launched under his leadership, and foresee that MD Anderson is exactly the institution to develop this service and bring it to underserved populations. An outcomes research program was also instituted under his leadership and has yet to reach national prominence. A program in nanotechnology and surgical applications has also been started. Dr. Pollock describes several of the exciting possibilities for treatment that this research will yield, and he also notes the first efforts of tissue engineering research.
Identifier
PollokRE_03_20121119-C16
Publication Date
11-19-2012
Publisher
The Making Cancer History® Voices Oral History Collection, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
City
Houston, Texas
Interview Session
Raphael Pollock, MD, Oral History Interview, November 19, 2012
Topics Covered
The Interview Subject's Story - Contributions to MD AndersonContributions Activities Outside InstitutionCareer and AccomplishmentsLeadershipThe LeaderThe AdministratorOn LeadershipMD Anderson CultureThe Life and Dedication of Clinicians and ResearchersBuilding/Transforming the Institution Multi-disciplinary ApproachesGrowth and/or Change
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Disciplines
History of Science, Technology, and Medicine | Oncology | Oral History
Transcript
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Given that you left your position earlier than you expected to, as you look back on that role, what were some initiatives that you were sorry you couldn’t bring to completion, and then what were others that you were very content that you were able to finish?
Raphael Pollock, MD:
In thinking about the clinical care and research agenda, to focus on two broad areas within the Division of Surgery, I am very pleased that we were able, by working closely with the department chairs, to assemble what I believe to be the best group of extirpative surgeons dealing exclusively with cancer that exist anywhere on the face of the earth.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
I missed that term.
Raphael Pollock, MD:
Extirpative.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Extirpative, okay.
Raphael Pollock, MD:
This is truly a phenomenal group of individuals who were carefully recruited not only for excellence in what they were doing clinically and their potential, in the case of younger people, but also a group of people who—which is sort of unusual for surgeons—were able to sublimate their egos, seeing that being part of something that was bigger than they themselves as individuals was going to actually give them much more leverage on the cancer problem. So we recruited and recruited judiciously to bring people like that forward, and the proof was in the pudding in terms of what this group has accomplished. We talked a moment ago about the comparators for the laboratory research program, but that comes against the backdrop of a group of surgeons who are spending an average of 750+ hours a year in the operating room. And you can do the arithmetic and see that that works out to about a quarter of their time is actually spent in the operating room, which is a huge time and energy commitment, bearing in mind that these people have to be promoted by the same criteria as any other faculty member at Anderson. They’re able to do that year in and year out. The Division of Surgery sees the largest number of new patients and consults of any division within the institution. That includes divisions that are numerically quite a bit larger than the Division of Surgery. We’re very proud of that. We’re proud of the reality that fifteen years ago, if someone had a complicated solid tumor problem and were in need of surgical solution, they would be told, “You have multiple different options throughout the United States,” and now repeatedly they are being told, “Your best option is coming to Houston.” So that probably is the single most important accomplishment. The second one being by working together rather than in a voluntary, non-demand, supportive mode, being able to engender the type of research program that we had been successful in doing and creating an environment that facilitated that, I’m not certain that in a more regimented, autocratic, data-productivity defined model that we would have garnered as much success as we have. So I’m very proud of that, not only the success of the group but the validation of the approach as being very, very important. Some things that have not been completed that I’m sorry have not, there were a number of sections within the division that I felt merited consideration towards becoming independent departments due to the fact that they had separate and independent board-certification mechanisms, so these were recognized as separate surgical specialties, and because we had worked very hard over the fourteen years with these groups to foster their own clinical and research program such that they could stand scrutiny as departments within MD Anderson, including orthopedics, ophthalmology, and dental oncology. And I’m sorry that this is not going to pass or see fruition on my watch, but I’m hopeful that this will be a strategic agenda item for the people that succeed me going forward. Another area that I did not anticipate would be completed under my watch but that I felt a very strong, personal identification with was the whole concept of developing telesurgery—remote site surgery—that was launched during the time that I was division head. I think that there are a number of people who become involved from all the departments through our minimally invasive surgeon program—MINTOS is the acronym—such that if there is an institution that will be able to do this, and in so doing it extended surgical outreach to medically, surgically underserved populations within the state, it certainly is this group of surgeons. That was one that I anticipated when I came back to visit after my retirement I would be able to see the progress and feel a strong sense of pride and connection around that issue. Likewise, a vigorous outcomes research program was started but has not yet reached the point where it can be identified as nationally prominent or able to stand on its own two feet. An additional area is the area of nanotechnology and its surgical applications. It’s very, very exciting work that is in its very early stages right now.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Could you describe in a little more detail what both of those are—the outcomes research program and the nanotechnology?
Raphael Pollock, MD:
Well, I think it’s going to be very, very important going forward that we be able to justify the types of operations and surgical procedures that we’re performing, vis-à-vis data-defined, data-described outcomes that can be translated into public accessibility. That is a movement that is being embraced throughout medicine, and Anderson has provided tremendous leadership within the discipline of surgical oncology for that. But that’s a program that needs ongoing allocation of resources and opportunities, particularly for the younger people who comprise the program, by and large, at this point. So that’s what that program is about. Nanotechnology is a whole other area. In its broadest definition, off the top of my head, it’s developing technologies on the nanomolecule level that are capable of being utilized to help patients on a more macro level. So for example, the work that Steve Curley is doing with nanotubules as a means of conducting radio frequency energy into live tumors in order to be able to help patients cope with hepatic metastases is a prime example of that type of technology.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
Is that a pain control?
Raphael Pollock, MD:
No, tumor treatment. So this opens up all sorts of new realms. The interface between diagnostic imaging on the molecular level and molecular surgery such that we will, in the future, be able to remove the portions of tumors that are particularly dangerous to patients in the event that we can’t remove the entire tumor for whatever technological or anatomic barriers is preventing that. That’s another area. A whole additional area that has not yet been developed but will develop in the future is the area of tissue engineering, being able to literally grow spare parts in the laboratory for patients. It will ultimately remarkably increase the scope of the resections that we can perform. While that’s many years away, initial starts have already begun and our plastic and reconstructive surgery group is very interested and very involved.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:
I talked to William Satterfield [Oral History Interview]. He describes growing the mandible for dental reconstruction and—
Raphael Pollock, MD:
Well, bone, nerve, intestine—I mean—there’s a lot of things that—skin, muscle, nerve tissue, so that we can basically splice in normal neuroconductive tissue in spinal cords that have been damaged. The implications are to attack some problems that have really made so many people miserable is potent and powerful, and these will be things that will happen later. But sowing the seeds and getting these programs on a firmer footing is something that I welcome the opportunity to do, and, again, I just hope and trust that these will be part of the strategic vision of my successors.
Recommended Citation
Pollock, Raphael E. MD and Rosolowski, Tacey A. PhD, "Chapter 16: Building Excellence and Therapeutic Promise" (2012). Interview Chapters. 1328.
https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1328
Conditions Governing Access
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