Massachusetts General Hospital

4th Annual Sacral Tumor Study Group Conference

19/Jan/2013

The Founders of the Sacral Tumor Study Group: Back row (left to right): Peter Rose, MD; Peter Bergh, MD, PhD; John Healey, MD; Francis Hornicek, MD, PhD. Front row (left to right): Guo Wei, MD; Patrick Boland, MD; Björn Gunterberg, MD, PhD; Joseph Schwab, MD, MS; Franklin Sim, MD; Michael Yaszemski, MD, PhD

The 4th Annual Sacral Tumor Study Group Conference was hosted by Francis Hornicek, MD, PhD and Joseph H. Schwab, MD, MS at the Massachusetts General Hospital on January 19, 2013. The group was founded in 2008 as a collaboration with Massachusetts General Hospital (Boston, MA), the Mayo Clinic (Rochester, MN) and the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (New York, NY). This alliance was the first of its kind created to gain insight into rare and difficult-to-treat tumors. Over the past four years, it has evolved to become a truly multidisciplinary forum.

This year, the meeting was attended by not only orthopedic surgeons, but general surgeons, plastic surgeons, radiation oncologist, pathologists, statisticians and basic scientists. Mass General and Sloan-Kettering presented data in a joint effort at this year’s meeting – a big step forward for the entire initiative, and a remarkable achievement for the individuals responsible. Investigators have high hopes for developing further collaborations at next year's meeting, which is scheduled to take place at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York.

Content provided Polina Osler, organizer of this event