This week, the UAB Department of Surgery is highlighting Omeed Moaven, M.D., a surgical oncologist and an assistant professor in the Department of Surgery and the Department of Cancer Biology at the Mayo Clinic in Florida.
Moaven received his medical degree from Mashhad University of Medical Sciences in Iran and completed a postdoctoral research fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital. He completed his general surgery residency training at UAB and a complex general surgical oncology fellowship at Wake Forest University.
Moaven is passionate about treating and researching pancreatic cancer and hepatobiliary malignancies. He is conducting translational studies and outcome research in various hepatopancreatobiliary (HPB) and gastrointestinal malignancies.
Can you tell us a little more about the clinical or research strides you are making?
"I am a surgical oncologist with a practice mainly focused on HPB cancers. My practice has a 70 percent clinical and 30 percent protected research time. From a research standpoint, I do both translational and clinical research, but I mainly focus on translational research focused on personalized approaches for treatment of pancreatic cancer. My research is focused on optimizing immunotherapy for pancreatic cancer.
My clinical practice is mainly focused on pancreatic and liver primary and metastatic malignancies. As an important part of my appointment, I am establishing a translational research program in HPB malignancies in the Department of Surgery of Mayo Clinic Florida (MCF), focusing on developing personalized approaches for the treatment of pancreatic cancer and precision approach in the treatment of pancreatic cancer with the focus on immuno-oncology approaches.
My research is focused on designing novel immuno-oncologic approaches for the treatment of pancreatic cancer. We attempt to achieve synergistic tumor toxicity by combining oncolytic virotherapy with various immunotherapeutic modalities to enhance the immune response in immunologically “cold’” tumors. We design novel oncolytic viruses to target therapeutic challenges in pancreatic cancer. We are also focused on designing CAR-T cells targeting pancreatic cancer in an attempt to be used in combination with our novel oncolytic viruses, to improve delivery and synergistically enhance immune response.
In addition to my translational research program, I am leading a multidisciplinary effort to establish a prehabilitation program for pancreatic cancer my institution. It is a comprehensive multimodality program which is focused on improving patients’ functional capacity, psychosocial well-being, and nutrition status in the preoperative setting and during the neoadjuvant treatment."
What has your journey at Mayo (and generally post-surgical training) looked like?
"During my training I invested in my passion to pursue my career in academic surgery. My goal is to become a surgeon scientist and develop my career accordingly. Of course this is a challenging path considering the complexity of the surgical care in HPB malignancies, but it can certainly be achieved with dedication, hard work, good mentorship and support from your institution. I have been fortunate to be supported by amazing mentors throughout my training and beyond."
How did your time at UAB Surgery prepare you for your career as an academic surgeon?
"I was fortunate to be trained by great surgeons at UAB. UAB surgical residency is a solid training program. In particular, and in the field of HPB surgical oncology, I mainly trained with Dr. Marty Heslin, as well as Drs. Sushanth Reddy and J. Bart Rose and John Christine. I was truly honored to be able to work with and have support from Dr. Heslin, Dr. Kirby Bland and Dr. Herb Chen. who have been and still are great mentors in my professional development.
My time at UAB Surgery has played a significant role in preparing me to become an academic surgeon. An important part of my achievements is due back to UAB and how it prepared me both from a clinical and research standpoint, as well as all around professional training. I was lucky to train with a power team of support and mentorship. I would also love to shout out Drs. Thomas Wang, Carla Contras, and John Porterfield. All other faculty, each of them, have had a significant impact on my training, and I am grateful for that. UAB offers a great general surgery residency training program, and the residents should take advantage of opportunities to fullest.”
What are you most looking forward to in the next steps of your career?
"In my short academic career I have been lucky to be awarded a career development grant. This is an important first step toward becoming an independent surgeon scientist. My goal is to continue and expand our research program and secure extramural large funding. I also look forward to leadership opportunities at the institutional level and professional surgical organizations in our field.
I am also passionate in training the next generation of surgeons, in particular, those who are interested in pursuing a similar path. As someone who owes his achievements to his mentors, I would love to provide the same support to my mentees and help them grow professionally."
What advice would you give a current surgery trainee?
"Advice is a loaded word! There are things, though, that I found helpful or wish I had focused more during my residency that I can share! Surgical residency could be challenging at times but is also very rewarding. If you have the passion of the path you’ve chosen, you can and should enjoy every moment of it. It is important to think of the residency or fellowship training as a journey and not as a checkpoint to get through–enjoy and cherish every moment. Build friendships and enjoy comraderies. Training certainly has its ups and downs, but if you have the passion, it will pass with joy and satisfaction.
Be honest with yourself and explore and learn what you want. Regardless of the path you chose in academic or private practice, I can’t stress enough how important mentorship is. Focus your efforts on identifying and meeting with good mentors early on, someone who cares and dedicates time to support you. Time is an essence, and it helps to define what you want early on and invest those goals. The sooner you can identify the path or specialty you are looking to pursue, the sooner you can invest in that goal. Reach out to people who have done this before and try to learn from them. Always seek constructive feedback on how you can further improve. There is always a better version of you that can strive for!"
Fay Fletcher Kerner Endowed Chair Herbert Chen, M.D., FACS, was honored to participate in Moaven’s mentorship and sponsorship.
“We are delighted to see how Dr. Moaven’s career has taken off at the Mayo Clinic,” said Chen. “His success story is one that we see often at UAB Surgery because we have dedicated faculty who are willing to mentor and sponsor our trainees. We wish Dr. Moaven all of the continued success in building his academic career as a surgeon scientist, and we look forward to the quality surgical oncology research he will continue to produce.”
Department of Surgery Chair Emeritus Kirby I. Bland, M.D., is proud to see Moaven continue to excel as he strives toward his goal of becoming a surgeon scientist.
“We were honored to have Dr. Moaven train with us here at UAB Surgery,” said Bland. “He showed great promise from early on in his surgical career, and it comes as no surprise that he has hit the ground running early in his academic career at the Mayo Clinic. We’re pleased to see all of the wonderful work he is doing in the treatment of pancreatic cancer.”