Dr. Ola Landgren is a hematologic oncologist and the new head of the myeloma program at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center.
For more information about Dr. Landgren and his plans for the program, click here or visit the UHealth blog.
Meet Inas Elattar
Inas Elattar is a competitive award-winning swimmer, a professor at the National Cancer Institute, and one of Sylvester’s newest patients - now that Dr. Ola Landgren is Chief of Sylvester’s myeloma program.
“He used to work at the NCI. He moved to the Sloan Kettering in New York, and now he came to Miami,” Elattar says. “Well, I’ve been moving with him, and I will keep on moving with him. You see, when you find someone so supportive and caring, as well is one of the best doctors, it’s a combination that they cannot beat.”
Ten years ago, Elattar was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a blood cancer that forms in plasma cells. Dr. Landgren has seen a dramatic increase in the life expectancy of his patients.
“Multiple myeloma is the second most common blood cancer that happens in adults. There are about 35,000 patients diagnosed every year in the United States. Around 150,000 people are living with the disease,” says Ola Landgren, M.D., Ph.D. “When I started my career, unfortunately the average survival was only one, two, or three years. But today, when patients are diagnosed, they have 10, 20 plus years of overall survival.”
Dr. Landgren, a world-renowned researcher dedicated to finding a cure for myeloma, says there are promising new treatments on the horizon.
“There are more than 20 new bi-specific monoclonal antibodies in development. And I think the first of them will probably come to be FDA approved, I would project, in early 2022. So, I would say the future looks extremely bright,” Dr. Landgren says.
“I think we probably are at the tipping point, where a patient probably can live with this disease almost perhaps at the same life span as a person of the same age and gender who did not get diagnosed with myeloma. Of course, we’d have to prove that, but I think that’s what I’m seeing. It really has been a transformative field for the past years.”
At 73, Inas has plans to compete in the world swimming championships next year.
“I feel very good and very positive,” Elattar says.
FOCUSING ON YOU
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