by Kathleen O’Neil

Cathie T. Chung, M.D., Ph.D., has been appointed to the breast oncology section of the Division of Medical Oncology & Therapeutics Research at City of Hope.

An experienced clinician and researcher, Chung will help develop new therapies to treat women with breast cancer, whether in its earliest stages or its latest. She previously served as assistant clinical professor in the Harold E. and Henrietta C. Lee Breast Center at USC/Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center.

“We are delighted to have Dr. Chung join our breast center’s world-class team,” said George Somlo, M.D., co-director of the Breast Cancer Program and director of breast oncology in the Division of Medical Oncology & Therapeutics Research. “She has an excellent reputation as a clinician and will provide guidance and support to our patients throughout their courses of treatment.”

At City of Hope, Chung will focus on developing clinical trials and growing City of Hope’s database of breast cancer cases for future research.

After earning a doctorate in physiology at the University of Illinois, Chung began her research career at the National Institutes of Health, where she studied signal transduction in the fields of infectious diseases and alcoholism and drug abuse. Yearning to see science come alive in patients, she returned to academia and completed her medical degree at the George Washington University School of Medicine in Washington, D.C., and completed her residency in internal medicine at UC San Francisco. She later was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship in medical oncology at Stanford University.

Following her fellowship training, Chung joined the breast oncology staff at the Stanford Comprehensive Cancer Center and worked on the development and conduct of clinical trials of early stage therapeutics.

Chung is board-certified in both internal medicine and medical oncology. Her work has appeared in The Oncologist, Clinical Breast Cancer and Molecular Cancer Therapeutics. She has served as a scientific reviewer for the Breast Cancer Research Program within the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs of the Department of Defense. “City of Hope is renowned for advanced cancer research and treatment,” Chung said. “I look forward to continuing my work to bring new therapies out of the laboratory and into clinics to treat breast cancer more successfully and prevent recurrences.”