Koczywas has been a staff physician at City of Hope since 2001, specializing in thoracic oncology and diseases of the lungs, including pleural mesothelioma.
She is part of the lung cancer and head and neck cancer teams at City of Hope, which is a world leader in the treatment and research of several serious diseases. Its goal is providing patients with the opportunity to live longer and much better lives.
“For patients who have just been told they have cancer, I want them to know there is a place they can come, either for treatment, or to get the best opinion,” Koczywas said. “At City of Hope, we have a great team of people where these patients can receive the best possible care.”
Improving Treatment with Clinical Trials
Koczywas is the principal investigator in several ongoing clinical trials, including two specifically involving mesothelioma.
One is a phase II trial studying the novel immunotherapy drug tazemetostat as a second-line treatment. The early results have been impressive and were presented at the 2018 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) conference in Chicago.
The other trial she is heading at City of Hope is studying the effectiveness of methoxyamine, a small-molecule inhibitor, when used in combination with standard chemotherapy. Previous studies with methoxyamine have shown its ability to counteract a body’s natural resistance to chemotherapy.
“There has been a real unmet need [with mesothelioma],” she said. “The idea is to be smarter than the cancer cells. We’re trying to reverse the resistance to chemotherapy.”
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A Believer in Personalized Therapy
Koczywas received her degree in 1984 from the Medical Academy of Lodz, in Lodz, Poland. She did a residency at St. Francis Medical Center in Pittsburgh.
She first came to City of Hope for fellowships that included the Department of Medical Oncology & Therapeutics Research and the Department of Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation.
She also is an outspoken advocate for combining palliative care with cancer treatment programs early in the process.
Koczywas is a strong believer in personalized, targeted therapy for cancer patients, which fuels her passion for clinical trials.
