Global Oncology Speakers

Joseph Lubega, MD, MPH, CPE

Dr. Joseph Lubega is Associate Director of the East Africa Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Fellowship Training Program and Chair of the Pediatric East Africa Clinical Oncology Consortium (PEACOC). He was previously the Medical Director for Global Hematology/Oncology Pediatric Excellence (HOPE) in Uganda. A core goal of his career is to improve the outcomes of children with blood diseases and cancer in low/middle income countries through building capacity for specialist education, clinical care, and research in pediatric hematology and oncology. To this end, he has led the establishment of the first university-accredited Pediatric Hematology and Oncology specialist program in the region that is training pediatricians from many countries across Africa in the sub-specialty. These trainees are the pioneers of pediatric cancer and blood diseases care in Africa and are already leading care, research, and training in their home countries. He has also built a multi-disciplinary team of pediatric cancer nursing, pediatric surgery, hematopathology, and radiation oncology that led to unprecedented improvements in outcomes of children with cancer, sickle cell disease and other blood diseases in the Sub-Sahara Africa setting.

Chidinma Pamela Anakwenze, MD, MPH

Chidinma obtained a Master of Public Health degree at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health where her studies focused primarily on leadership and management, epidemiology and biostatistics, and international health. She is completed medical school at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. As a medical student, Chidinma designed and executed a cervical and breast cancer educational intervention in Western Jamaica. Her work in Jamaica and her undergraduate education in biomedical engineering led to her interest in radiation oncology. As she learned more about oncology, she became increasingly aware of the disparities in cancer care that exist globally, especially within her home country of Nigeria which has less than one radiotherapy unit per 19 million people as compared to the one unit per 250,000 in high-income countries. These barriers to healthcare inspired her to pursue an MPH and work toward improving cancer care globally. While obtaining her MPH, Chidinma traveled to Nigeria to characterize radiotherapy at the University of Ibadan and identify barriers to care that might inform efforts to improve radiotherapy access in low-resource settings. She is presently focused on exploring methods to expand radiotherapy globally, with a specific focus on the use of public-private partnerships.

Mark Zafereo, MD

Dr. Mark Zafereo is an Associate Professor of Head and Neck Surgery at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. He is Section Chief of Head and Neck Endocrine Surgery and Associate Medical Director of the Endocrine Center at MD Anderson Cancer Center. Dr. Zafereo holds national committee appointments for the American Head and Neck Society, American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, and American Board of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, and he is a Past President of the Houston Society of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. He has published extensively on Thyroid and other Head & Neck cancers, speaking nationally and internationally. His clinical practice focuses on patients afflicted with thyroid cancer and parathyroid neoplasms.