Master Clinicians

Jessica J. Kandel, MD, is an expert in pediatric surgery. She specializes in the treatment of pediatric cancers, including Wilms tumor, neuroblastoma and hepatoblastoma, as well as vascular anomalies (hemangiomas, venous malformations, lymphatic malformations).

Dr. Kandel’s research focuses on the development and differentiation of blood vessels (angiogenesis) in solid tumors and vascular anomalies. She was a leader in early studies that suppressed tumor growth by blocking vascular endothelial growth factor, a protein that stimulates angiogenesis. Dr. Kandel’s work contributed to the development of bevacizumab, a drug used to manage metastatic colorectal, lung, and kidney cancers.

As the primary investigator on several long-term studies, Dr. Kandel’s current goal is to understand how tumors become resistant to therapies in order to identify new treatments for refractory cancers. Her research has been funded by notable organizations including the National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer Society, and the Pediatric Cancer Foundation.

Dr. Kandel has contributed widely to medical literature, publishing more than 60 peer-reviewed articles and three book chapters on angiogenesis and tumor growth. She currently serves as an editor for Oncology Letters and as an ad hoc reviewer for several other scientific journals. In addition, Dr. Kandel is a popular speaker and a dedicated educator, mentoring medical students, residents, and fellows on a range of research projects related to tumor modeling.

Michael R. Bishop, MD, specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of lymphomas and leukemias. In particular, he cares for patients with hematologic malignancies that have not responded to first-line treatments. An expert in hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (bone marrow transplantation), Dr. Bishop and his team are working to address the unique social, economic, physiological and biological issues that patients face while undergoing this treatment.

Dr. Bishop’s research focuses on the prevention and treatment of relapse after stem cell transplantation. Relapse is the primary cause of treatment failure and death after stem cell transplantation. He has served as the primary investigator on studies designed to prevent and treat disease recurrence after transplantation. Specifically, he works on ways to enhance immune effects of the transplanted cells against cancer.

An active contributor to medical literature, Dr. Bishop has authored more than 150 peer-reviewed articles, in addition to more than 30 book chapters and two books on cancer treatment and research. He also serves on the editorial board of numerous scientific journals, including Biology of Blood and Marrow Transplantation.

Dr. Bishop is a dedicated mentor, teaching residents and fellows in classroom, clinical and research settings. Many of his past trainees hold leadership roles in medical oncology and immunology at academic medical centers or at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Maryland.

Since 2001, Dr. Bishop has consistently been named one of the “Best Doctors in America” by Best Doctors, Inc. He previously served as a senior investigator and as the clinical head of stem cell transplantation for the National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health.

2013 Pilot Grant Project: A Pilot Program of Cost Communication in Hematologic Malignancies

Dr. Milner attended medical school at the University of Pennsylvania and then completed his residency training in General Surgery as well as fellowship training in Vascular Surgery at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He received numerous teaching awards during his time as a resident and fellow at Penn. At the end of his fellowship, he was awarded the Marco Polo Fellowship from the Society for Vascular Surgery. As the Marco Polo Fellow, he worked at the University Medical Center, Utrecht, The Netherlands studying aortic aneurysmal disease and endovascular therapy. He performed the initial work investigating the value of remote pressure sensor use for surveillance of aneurysms after endovascular repair.

Following the fellowship, he joined the faculty at Emory University first as Assistant Professor and later as Associate Professor and Program Director of the Vascular Surgery fellowship. He moved to Chicago in 2009 after accepting the position of Chief of Vascular Surgery at Loyola University Medical Center. In January 2012, he was recruited to the University of Chicago Medicine as Associate Professor and Co-Director of the Center for Aortic Diseases. He is passionate about the care of vascular patients with a specific clinical and research focus on aortic aneurysm disease.

2013 Pilot Grant Project: “A Formal Curriculum in Surgical Professionalism and Ethics”: To enhance and encourage the professionalism of surgical residents and their understanding of the central concepts of surgical ethics

2013 Pilot Grant Project: Improving Professionalism for Physicians in Training: A Curriculum based Approach.