Childhood cancer survivor turned pediatric oncologist aims to ‘give hope’ to patients
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Richard Gorlick, MD, received this year’s ASCO Pediatric Oncology Award, which recognizes an individual who made outstanding contributions to the field.
Perhaps fittingly, his experiences as a childhood cancer survivor more than 4 decades ago inspired his career in medicine and shaped the way he cares for his own patients.
When Gorlick was diagnosed with sarcoma at age 13, treatments were far less advanced than today. He was uncertain he’d live to see adulthood.
“When you’re faced with that, your first reaction is just getting through the illness,” Gorlick — now division head and distinguished chair of pediatrics at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center — told Healio. “As I ... got past the acute part of that journey, a career in medicine very much came to my mind.”
Personal journey
Gorlick — who also serves as department chair ad interim of sarcoma medical oncology at MD Anderson — said his experience as a child with sarcoma was a “straightforward” inspiration for his career as an oncologist.
“I was very grateful to the field and everything that went into it,” Gorlick said. “I wanted to be an oncologist, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to go back to pediatrics. I thought that might be tough. Then, in medical school, I realized that my experience could add meaning to what I do as a physician. It could give hope to others.”
Aside from turning toward caring for children, Gorlick’s career evolved in another important way. Although he initially focused on patient care, he credited some key mentors with helping him understand the value and large-scale impact of cancer research.
“These mentors convinced me that you help a patient by caring for them one at a time, but the way you change a field is through research,” Gorlick said. “In that way, you’re advancing things for everybody in aggregate.”
Gorlick said it has been incredibly rewarding to be able to help other children facing a cancer diagnosis. However, he emphasized the need to be careful not to assume his patients’ experiences are the same as his.
“I certainly have a lot of empathy for them, but I’ve also learned that everybody has their own journey,” he said. “I had my journey and they have to go through theirs. It’s very important that I don’t overly extrapolate my experience to theirs.”
Career highlights
Gorlick’s work in pediatric oncology has offered hope to new generations of children with cancer.
He has published more than 325 peer-reviewed papers, reviews and book chapters. He supports several pediatric oncology organizations, including NCI’s Pediatric Preclinical in Vivo Testing (PIVOT), the Sarcoma Alliance for Research through Collaboration Consortium, and Children’s Oncology Group (COG).
In his early involvement with COG, Gorlick’s laboratory was instrumental in establishing a bone tumor bank. Now considered the world’s largest osteosarcoma tissue bank, Gorlick calls it one of the professional achievements about which he is most proud.
Other career highlights for Gorlick include his work in preclinical drug testing and his mentorship efforts.
Gorlick said his selection as an ASCO Special Award recipient is particularly meaningful, as ASCO recognition early in his career reinforced his decision to pursue pediatric oncology research.
“The reality is that making that transition to having your own lab and your own independent career is a challenge,” Gorlick said. “Very early on, I got an ASCO Young Investigator Award. A year later, I received a career development award. It really helped with the transition. It’s a great honor to again be recognized by ASCO, when they helped me at a critical point in my career.”
‘Our goal needs to be cure’
Gorlick acknowledged the enormous progress in pediatric oncology in recent decades.
However, he looks forward to continuing to tackle some of the major challenges that remain.
“There are areas in which pediatric oncology has made wonderful progress, and this correctly creates the perception that pediatric malignancies are the ‘success story’ of oncology,” Gorlick said. “That said, there are a lot of malignancies where the progress has not been as great. If we look at metastatic solid tumors, sarcomas and brain tumors, the progress has been limited. In osteosarcoma, there infamously has not been a change in survival in 30 to 40 years.”
Even when patients survive these cancers, many continue to face health risks that far exceed those of the general population. Work still needs to be done to improve long-term survivorship for children with cancer.
“It forces us to use caution around the word ‘cure,’” Gorlick said. “’Cure’ implies your risk for everything is the same as it was before. Our goal has to be ‘cure,’ meaning we eradicate the cancer and they live normal lives afterward.”
For more information:
Richard Gorlick, MD, can be reached at rgorlick@mdanderson.org.
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