May is Bladder Cancer Awareness Month and a busy time for doctors at the new Johns Hopkins Greenberg Bladder Cancer Institute.
They are talking — and several are walking — to raise awareness of a deadly disease that they say has been overshadowed by better known cancers.
Dr. Trinity Bivalacqua, 40, of Roland Park, is director of urologic oncology and division chief of bladder cancer at the Johns Hopkins Brady Urological Institute and Greenberg Bladder Cancer Institute. He's also assistant professor of urology, surgery and oncology at Hopkins' School of Medicine.
Dr. Noah Hahn, 43, of Towson, is medical oncologist at the bladder cancer institute and a Hopkins associate professor of oncology and urology.
Dr. William Isaacs, 59, a Gilman School graduate and former Guilford resident who now lives in Butler, is interim director of the $45 million bladder cancer institute, a virtual institute that is housed at Hopkins hospital complex. He is also a Hopkins professor of neurology and oncology, specializing in inherited predisposition for cancers.
All three will be among the speakers at a first-ever symposium on bladder cancer — free and open to the public — that will be held May 7 at the hospital in East Baltimore.
In addition, Isaacs and Bivalacqua will join in the Bladder Cancer Advocacy Network's 2015 Baltimore Walk for Bladder Cancer on May 3, one of many walks sponsored by the network nationwide.
The local walk, in Canton Waterfront Park starting with registration at 9 a.m., will be a family affair for Bivalacqua, his wife, Leslie, 41, and their three children, Zoe, 11, Julian, 8, and Parker Annie, 5.
"We're all walking," he said.
Hahn will be out of town that day and won't be able to walk, "unfortunately," he said.
But he added, "Every chance we get, we're out there on the pavement."
Common cancer
The three doctors are helping to bring attention to bladder cancer, which is called the "invisible cancer," because it does not have the high visibility of diseases such as breast, prostate and colon cancers.
In the U.S. alone, it is the sixth most commonly diagnosed cancer, with 16,000 deaths and 73,000 new cases a year. Mostly seniors and smokers are diagnosed with the disease, and women outnumber men by a ratio of 3-1, the doctors said in a joint interview last week. They added, however, that bladder cancer is the fourth leading cancer in men.
About 70 percent of all newly diagnosed cases are noninvasive. After the tumor is removed surgically, the patient is treated with medication to prevent recurrence and progression.
When caught early, the prognosis is "excellent," Bivalacqua said. But it requires lifelong attention and treatment, because in the advanced stages it is "incurable," he said.
Hahn said it's important to raise awareness about bladder cancer because, "It's not well publicized or understood. People don't understand the symptoms, the signs and the aggressiveness of the disease."
"This is a major cancer," Isaacs said. He said symptoms include blood in urine, increased frequency of urination and a burning sensation when urinating. In fact, any changes in urinating habits could be warning signs, he said.
Although Hahn, Isaacs and Bivalacqua are leading spokesmen for the institute, the biggest ambassador is the unique institute itself. It was launched last year with a $15 million gift from the Glyndon-based Erwin and Stephanie Greenberg Foundation — an amount unprecedented at Hopkins for bladder cancer research — and another $30 million from Hopkins.
"Our foundation directs its funds to important research," Erwin Greenberg told the Baltimore Sun Media Group then. "By creating an institute, it brings a whole new emphasis on bladder cancer, with a director and a dedicated staff."
"There's really not anything like this," said Hahn, who was recruited from Indiana University.
Currently located in The Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at the Hopkins hospital complex on North Broadway in East Baltimore, the bladder cancer institute eventually will be based in the Albert P. "Skip" Viragh Jr. building, which is expected to open in 2016. Isaacs envisions the now-virtual institute eventually having its own dedicated space if it proves popular enough.
A search is underway for a permanent institute director, who is expected to be chosen during the summer or fall, Isaacs said. He said he is not a candidate and will go back to being a professor once a successor is named.
Isaacs said the institute, with nearly 40 faculty members, researchers and post-doctorate students, comes under the purview of the dean of the School of Medicine. Although the institute works closely with the Kimmel Cancer Center, it is not part of the center, because, "We didn't want it to be overshadowed by other cancers," Isaacs said.
Localized treatment
The institute prides itself on its multidisciplinary approach, a kind of one-stop shopping center that draws from several Hopkins School of Medicine departments, including urology, pathology and oncology.
"We have leaders in every one of those fields in the same place," Hahn said.
"It's all localized treatment and you have everyone in-house," Bivalacqua said.
"There's a whole team of experts here," Isaacs said. "This institute is going to try to capitalize on those people."
The multidisciplinary aspect of the institute is a big advantage.
"In the last 1-2 years, we have learned exponentially more about what the biology of bladder cancer is than we ever knew before. That's one of the points of emphasis for us on the research side," Hahn said.
One of the institute's functions is to award grants for research projects — about $270,000 in the past year, Isaacs said.
"For many years, there was nothing new to add to what was understood," Bivalacqua said. But now, he said, "We understand what causes this cancer to grow and spread."
That understanding has led to "actual targets" for potential drugs, and more interest being shown by pharmaceutical companies, Hahn said.
Even immunology is part of the multidisciplinary approach, since research is showing "a tremendous amount of promise in using the immune system in treating bladder cancer," Hahn said.
Although developing new therapies and technologies is important for the institute, the doctors stress that nothing is more important than getting the public's attention.
"It's really about the awareness," Isaacs said.