Nancy L. Cho, MD and Erika L. Rangel, MD Appointed BWH Surgery Associate Clerkship Directors

Nancy L. Cho, MD and Erika L. Rangel, MD, have been appointed associate clerkship directors in the Department of Surgery. In this important role, they will help to oversee the Core Surgery rotation during the HMS Primary Clinical Experience in collaboration with clerkship director Reza Askari, MD.

 

Nancy L. Cho, MD Headshot
Nancy L. Cho, MD

Nancy L. Cho, MD
Associate Surgeon, Division of General and Gastrointestinal Surgery
Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Associate Clerkship Director, Department of Surgery, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Assistant Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Dr. Cho is an associate surgeon in the Division of General and Gastrointestinal Surgery, Section of Endocrine Surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and assistant professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School. She received her medical degree from Columbia University, College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, NY and completed both her General Surgery Residency and Endocrine Surgery Fellowship at BWH.

Dr. Cho is board certified in General Surgery. Her clinical interests include endocrine diseases of the thyroid/parathyroid glands and melanoma. Her primary research focus involves studying tumor-stroma biology with the goal of developing more effective, patient-specific treatment strategies.

 

Erika L. Rangel, MD, MS, FACS Headshot
Erika L. Rangel, MD, MS, FACS

Erika L. Rangel, MD, MS, FACS
Associate Surgeon, Division of Trauma, Burn, Surgical & Critical Care
Associate Clerkship Director
Department of Surgery, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Director of Surgical Critical Care and Inpatient Programs, Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital
Instructor in Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Dr. Rangel is an associate surgeon in the Division of Trauma, Burn, Surgical & Critical Care at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and instructor in surgery at Harvard Medical School. She received her medical degree from the University of California San Francisco (USCF) School of Medicine in San Francisco, CA and completed both her General Surgery Residency and Critical Care Fellowship at BWH.

Dr. Rangel is board certified in both General Surgery and Surgical Critical Care. Her clinical interests include: acute care surgery, biliary tract disease, minimally invasive hernia surgery, abdominal wall reconstruction and diverticular disease. Her academic research focuses on surgical education, parenting and work-life integration during residency and improving outcomes for geriatric patients after emergency surgery

Welcoming New Faculty – Elizabeth A. Mittendorf, MD, PhD

Please join us in welcoming Elizabeth A. Mittendorf, MD, PhD, as a new faculty member in the Department of Surgery.

Elizabeth A. Mittendorf, MD, PhD Headshot
Elizabeth A. Mittendorf, MD, PhD

Elizabeth A. Mittendorf, MD, PhD
Rob and Karen Hale Distinguished Chair in Surgical Oncology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Director of Surgical Research, Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women’s Cancer Center (DF/BWCC) Breast Program
Director, Breast Immuno-Oncology Program, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Co­-Director, Breast Cancer Clinical Research Program, Breast Oncology Program, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Member of the Faculty, Harvard Medical School

Dr. Elizabeth A. Mittendorf is a graduate of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland, OH where she also completed a residency in General Surgery.  After completing her residency, she served on active duty in the United States military before completing a fellowship in Surgical Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX. Dr. Mittendorf also holds a PhD in Immunology from the University of Texas Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences at Houston.

Prior to joining Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Dr. Mittendorf was a professor in the Department of Breast Surgical Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX. She joined the faculty at MD Anderson in 2008.

Dr. Mittendorf is board certified by the America Board of Surgery. She maintains a busy clinical practice and oversees a portfolio of clinical trials as well as a basic laboratory effort.

She is principal investigator on a number of clinical protocols including the phase III PRESENT (Prevention of Recurrence in Early-Stage, Node-Positive Breast Cancer with Low to Intermediate HER2 Expression with NeuVax Treatment) study, and a multicenter phase II trial investigating the efficacy of a CD8+ T cell eliciting vaccine in combination with trastuzumab which is based on preclinical data generated in her laboratory and follows a phase I trial she conducted demonstrating the combination to be safe. This trial is supported by a Breakthrough Award from the Department of Defense (DoD).

Dr. Mittendorf is also the principal investigator on a multi-center trial supported by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) evaluating the impact of vaccination in patients with ductal carcinoma in situ, a trial evaluating the impact of preoperative radiation therapy on the immune response in breast tumors, as well as two investigator initiated studies evaluating immune checkpoint blockade administered in the presurgical setting to breast cancer patients.

Her laboratory work is focused on identifying novel tumor antigens and investigating aspects of the tumor microenvironment that impact the response to immunotherapy. Specifically, she is investigating mutations in the ESR1 gene as targets for vaccination as well as the impact of standard therapies on the immune microenvironment with the goal of informing rational clinical trials evaluating the addition of immunotherapy to treatment regimens for breast cancer patients. This work is supported by the Komen for the Cure Foundation and the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy.