Leigh Ellis – Stopping Cancer Before It Spreads
Why can’t we just identify which patients are going to metastasize right when they’re diagnosed, and then stop their progression to metastasis? This is the question that PCF Young Investigator, Leigh Ellis, asked in a conversation with our very own Howard Soule a few years ago. This question led to was the idea of Interception in prostate cancer patients. The idea is simple: identify the primary cancer in a patient that has the potential to metastasize and stop it before it gets the chance to spread.
In our fight against cancer it can be very easy to get caught up in the idea of a cure. It is our nature to want to eliminate, altogether, this thing that causes us so much pain. But, what kills people with cancer is often not the cancer itself, but the spreading of the cancer and the disruption it causes to the body. Ellis’s research works to stop the metastasizing, or spreading, of cancer in patients that ultimately lead to the horrible symptoms and deaths we have come to associate with cancer.
By identifying the primary cancer that has metastatic potential and then intercepting it before it spreads, we have the potential to drastically improve the lives of patients with prostate cancer. Patient quality of life, and overall well-being of patients’ post-diagnosis, is a top priority for Leigh Ellis and all of us here at the Prostate Cancer Foundation.
Leigh Ellis is a PCF Young Investigator and a member of faculty at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. We are proud to help fund the life-improving research Leigh Ellis and his team work to provide every single day.