Cardio-oncology is a field in rapid evolution and growth. Both cancer and cardiovascular disease are the largest contributors to morbidity and mortality in the United States. Despite this tremendous public health burden, there are fundamental gaps in our understanding of disease mechanisms and in the application of evidence-based strategies for the clinical care of this growing population.

My research lab focuses on understanding the underlying mechanisms and predictors of cancer therapy cardiotoxicity and heart failure, and translating this understanding to the clinical care of patients. Our programmatic objectives are to use innovative strategies in deep cardiovascular phenotyping to define an individual cancer patient’s risk of developing subsequent cardiovascular disease. Our ongoing projects focus on determining the role of mechanistic markers in understanding and predicting incident cardiotoxicity and adverse cardiovascular outcomes, focused on the use of circulating biomarkers and imaging-derived measures of myocardial mechanics and sensitive measures of myocardial function. We have established multiple patient cohorts in order to ask these questions of interest. Our goals also include the development of novel intervention studies to mitigate cardiovascular risk in cancer patients and survivors. Our multi-disciplinary approach is fostered through the Penn Cardio-Oncology Center of Excellence, which I direct.

I also lead the Penn Center for Quantitative Echocardiography, focused on using state-of-the-art 2D, 3D, and Doppler acquisition and quantitation to understand cardiac function and remodeling across various diseases.