Miguel Alvelo-Rivera

Bio

Miguel Alvelo-Rivera, M.D., left quite an impression as a resident at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, where he finished his training as a thoracic surgeon almost 10 years ago.

Patients don't easily forget great doctors.

Alvelo-Rivera, now in Detroit at the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute at Wayne State University, became the topic of discussion a year ago on the Cancer Survivors Network, American Cancer Society website when a surgical candidate was asking for advice about a possible esophagectomy.

Cancer survivor, William W. Marshall, 73, still remembered well his similar surgery and the care he received from almost a decade before. His endorsement was ringing.

"I recommend wholeheartedly Dr. Miguel Alvelo-Rivera, an extremely talented young thoracic surgeon. He assisted Dr. Luketich [in Pittsburgh] with my … surgery on May 17, 2003. He visited me daily, attended to my every need while I was a patient [there]. He was tireless. He was busy at the hospital from morning to night. I began to wonder if he ever slept.

"I would highly recommend him, and would trust my body to him if I ever need another operation. He is highly skilled, and trained in the latest laparoscopic techniques."

Alvelo-Rivera is a little older and a lot wiser today than he was in Pittsburgh, where he first honed his skills, but his attention to patients remains. He joined the Karmanos Cancer Institute at Wayne State in October of 2010 after several years at the Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute in Tampa.

He specializes in minimally-invasive thoracic surgery, esophageal surgery, palliative procedures for lung cancer and esophageal cancers, and the multi-disciplinary management of mesothelioma and lung and chest wall cancers.

He again worked with Luketich in 2003 to help publish a study on "Photodynamic Therapy as Palliation for Esophageal Cancer" in the Annals of Thoracic Surgery. They studied 215 patients, concluding that 85 percent of them received effective palliative care.

He was part of the panel at the 2011 State of the Art Treatment of Gastrointestinal Cancers Seminar in Detroit. He spoke on Surgical Management of Localized Esophageal Cancer.

He received his medical degree from the University of Puerto Rico Medical Sciences Campus, along with much of his postgraduate training before moving to Pittsburgh.