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Sunnybrook Research Institute

Kathleen Pritchard, MD

Senior Scientist

Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre
2075 Bayview Ave., Room T2 107
Toronto, ON
M4N 3M5

Phone: 416.480.4616
Fax: 416.480.6002

Administrative Assistant: Sabina Trebinjac
Phone: 416.480.4616
Fax: 416.480.6002
Email: sabina.trebinjac@sunnybrook.ca

Dr. Pritchard is a medical oncologist and clinical trials research scientist. Her major areas of interest include the following:

  • multicentre clinical trials: design, conduct and analysis;
  • adjuvant therapy for breast cancer;
  • correlative and translational research in breast cancer;
  • tumour/tissue/serum/data banking;
  • predictive and prognostic factors in breast cancer;
  • hormonal therapy for breast cancer; and
  • biologic therapy for breast cancer.

In 2005, Dr. Pritchard was awarded the O. Harold Warwick Prize for Cancer Control in Canada by the Canadian Cancer Society and the National Cancer Institute of Canada for her work in clinical and translational trials in breast cancer.

Education:

  • B.A.Sc., 1968, Science, Queen's University, Canada
  • MD, 1971, Queen's University, Canada
  • Research fellowship, 1974, Tumour Immunology, University of Toronto, Canada
  • Research fellowship, 1978, Clinical Trials in Breast Cancer, University of Toronto, Canada

Appointments and Affiliations:

  • Senior scientist, evaluative clinical sciences - Odette Cancer Research Program, Sunnybrook Research Institute
  • Co-chair, National Cancer Institute of Canada Clinical Trials Breast Cancer Site Group
  • Professor, departments of medicine and public health sciences, faculty of medicine, University of Toronto
  • Clinical director, Ontario Clinical Oncology Group
  • Board of directors member, American Society of Clinical Oncology
  • Medical oncologist, Odette Cancer Centre

Research Foci:

  • Breast cancer
  • Clinical trials
  • Predictive and prognostic factors
  • Correlative research

Research Summary:

As chair of the National Cancer Institute of Canada Clinical Trials Breast Cancer Site Group, Dr. Pritchard has guided the development and performance of multicentre Canadian clinical trials of new therapies for women with breast cancer for over 15 years.

Her research has included clinical trials and translational approaches in the areas of adjuvant therapy, hormonal therapy, chemotherapy and optimal locoregional therapy for breast cancer. She has also been a member of the team conducting prevention trials comparing tamoxifen and raloxifene (NSABP).

Some of Dr. Pritchard’s achievements include the following:

  • First to show that tamoxifen is effective in premenopausal women with metastatic disease, and describe its role in postmenopausal adjuvant therapy.
  • One of the first to describe the frequency of thromboembolic complications associated with chemotherapy and tamoxifen and lead a randomized trial of low-dose coumadin to prevent such thromboemboli.
  • Help develop the CEF regimen, which is now the standard adjuvant chemotherapy for premenopausal women with node-positive breast cancer in Canada.
  • Demonstrate the relationship between her-2-neu overexpression and improved response to CEF compared to CMF in the adjuvant therapy of breast cancer, thus helping to describe a new predictive factor in the adjuvant chemotherapy of breast cancer.

Dr. Pritchard holds a major leadership role in a number of national and international multicentre clinical trials. She is a frequent consultant for a variety of scientific and clinical groups and member of scientific advisory boards and independent data monitoring committees for clinical trials worldwide.

Dr. Pritchard is also widely published in the major cancer journals, and currently serves on the editorial boards of New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Current Oncology, Clinical Breast Cancer, The Oncologist, and Breast and Medscape (Oncology and Women's Health).

Selected Publications:

See current publications list at PubMed.

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