Anna Hoppmann, M.D., MPH, a second-year fellow in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and post-doctoral trainee in UAB’s T32 Cancer Prevention and Control Training Program, received one of the 2020 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting Merit Awards. These distinguished awards are sponsored by Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation, and the 2020 Scientific Program Committee to honor oncology trainees who selected to present their first author abstract at the ASCO Annual Meeting.

Dr. Hoppmann received this award for her abstract titled, “Individual prediction of non-adherence to oral mercaptopurine (6MP) in children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL): Results from COG AALL03N1 study.” Co-authors include Yanjun Chen, Wendy Landier, Lindsey Hageman, Mary V. Relling, F. Lennie Wong, Smita Bhatia.

"Dr. Bhatia and her team have shown that when children with leukemia are non-adherent to oral chemotherapy with mercaptopurine, they are more likely to suffer leukemia relapse,” explains Dr. Hoppmann. “This work builds an individual risk prediction model to determine which patients are at highest risk for chemotherapy non-adherence in real time in order to provide targeted interventions to families with poor adherence. The 2020 Conquer Cancer Merit Award will promote the original research at the annual ASCO meeting and provides meeting registration and a monetary award and this is a huge affirmation of this work."

This year, Conquer Cancer recognized 104 Merit Award recipients for research achievements and advancements in their respective field within the cancer care community with Merit Awards.

Congratulations Dr. Hoppmann!