Current Research and Scholarly Interests
My research focuses on outcomes in treatment of muscle invasive and high-grade non-muscle invasive bladder cancer. This includes identifying markers of prognosis, predictive markers for response to surgery and chemotherapy, and working toward an individualized, multidisciplinary approach to disease management. We are particularly interested in the impact of surgical quality measures on outcome for patients with invasive disease. I have also focused on optimizing the use of lower urinary tract reconstruction in patients undergoing cystectomy, and identifying interventions to improve patient quality of life. This has included a large prospective randomized study of two alternative forms of continent neobladder, and evaluating the effect of prior radiation or chemotherapy on the outcome with this surgery. We continue to follow these patients long term to evaluate renal function and complications, and to mine the rich data from this trial to better understand the long term outcomes with this reconstructive surgery. We are also using the outcomes of this trial to design early interventions to avoid complications and improve patient quality of life after the operation.
