A physician researcher with deep experience in pancreatic cancer treatment and research will be the next director of UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center.
The university health system recently named Dr. Diane M. Simeone of Perlmutter Cancer Center in New York to the position, effective April 1.
Top UC San Diego leadership has been searching for a new cancer director since Dr. Joseph Califano resigned mid-2023, stating that he intended to return to the treatment and research of head and neck cancers. In June, media coverage in a well-read trade publication connected the departure to internal “turmoil,” especially in Moores’ clinical trials office which, coverage said, had become so dysfunctional that patient safety could be jeopardized.
The university pushed back against those assertions while also acknowledging that some changes were necessary, and were in fact already underway, especially in the administration of the more than 200 clinical trials it offers as the region’s only comprehensive cancer center designated by the National Cancer Institute.
Simeone’s announcement, published by UCSD last week, highlights her leadership skills while also praising her participation in research that has generated “more than 230 studies in leading peer-reviewed journals.” Those bonafides include directing Perlmutter’s pancreatic cancer and translational research centers. She has also chaired the scientific and medical advisory board of the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network and as principal investigator of Precision Promise, a clinical trials consortium in pancreatic cancer.
Getting a new director in place quickly is important because work must begin on renewal of a critical source of funding. In 2025, the cancer center must apply for renewal of its support grant from the National Cancer Institute. Federal records indicate that the grant supplied $77.9 million for the center over the past five years, and the process to win renewal is universally described as a rigorous review of the care and research the center engaged in over the previous five-year period. The process was to start in 2024, but the NCI granted an extension.
Applications are reviewed not just by federal employees but also by peers working at other designated centers.
Simeone has more than a passing familiarity with the peer-review process. She currently serves on the National Cancer Institute’s Cancer Centers Study Section, which conducts various types of grant application reviews. The physician will serve as the principal investigator for UCSD’s application, though review regulations require her to recuse herself from reviewing the grant request.
“Dr. Simeone has driven transformation in cancer care by building a continuum between groundbreaking research and new therapeutic approaches for cancer detection and treatment,” said Dr. John Carethers, vice chancellor for health sciences at UCSD in a statement. “She brings a wealth of expertise and vision to her new role as director, and we are deeply honored to have her join us.”
The physician and surgeon earned her medical doctorate from Duke University in 1988 and completed a surgical residency at University of Michigan Hospital in 1995 with board certification in general surgery in 1996. She is now a professor of surgery at New York University Grossman School of Medicine.
Reached by telephone Wednesday, Simeone said she and her husband, Dr. Theodore Welling, a surgeon specializing in liver, pancreatic and bile duct cancers, will both join the UCSD Health faculty after their move west. The couple have two adult children.
What follows is a condensed question-and-answer session with Moores Cancer Center’s newest leader:
Q: Pancreatic cancer is one of the most-intractable forms of the disease. How did you decide that this would be your specialty?
A: I think it really stems back to when I was a resident and realizing that this was a disease that very few people were working on, and it was almost uniformly fatal. From a surgical perspective, we really didn’t have much to offer. As I finished my training, it was an area of unmet need. It has taken time, but there is now some substantial movement in the field, and I feel we are on the cusp of really driving improvement in survival. In the next five years, based on pretty significant advances in drug development and early-detection technologies, I think there are some exciting developments coming.
Q: What intrigued you about the opportunity at Moores Cancer Center?
A: I’ve actually given talks at UCSD and some of the nearby institutions including Salk Institute and Sanford Burnham, and I’ve also attended scientific conferences in the San Diego area. I’ve always been struck by the depth and breadth of the science, especially in biotech, along with the highly collaborative nature of how people work together. If you look across the country, it’s a very unique environment where all of the pieces you would like to see are present and can be pulled together to impact patients’ lives. As I went through the process of meeting with the very-committed faculty and wonderful leadership at UCSD, it seemed like the perfect fit.
Q: What do you make of recent media coverage that indicates Moores needs a significant overhaul, especially in its clinical trials efforts?
A: I do know that there has been a very marked investment and a clear leadership commitment to enhance clinical trials. That’s a topic of focus for many cancer centers, because there can sometimes be a gap from excellent science to moving it into the clinical space where it can have impact for patients. Over my career, I have tried to really help accelerate interdisciplinary research, and I think UCSD is in a very unique position to leverage its science for early-detection tools, technologies for cancer prevention, and new therapeutics in ways that many cancer centers are not.
Q: How does an incoming director get a feel for how an organization such as Moores compares with its peers?
A: I sit on a committee that reviews comprehensive cancer centers across the country, so I have a very good feel for, you know, what best practices are. I think that UCSD is very, very well-positioned. One of the things I was most struck with when I came and met with numerous faculty and also trainees at UCSD is they love the place. I think, really, my job is just to help bring everybody together and to help decrease the activation energy, if you will, that is required to try to translate science into new clinical trials and clinical approaches.
Q: That’s an interesting phrase, “activation energy,” what have you found it takes to spark that jump from basic research to preclinical and clinical investigation which many have called “the valley of death” due to the high expense and failure rates that occur when when ideas meet patients?
A: When I first went to NYU, our clinical trial effort in pancreatic cancer was very low and, within three years, we were putting a quarter of our patients in clinical trials. You have to recognize and make sure everybody knows its importance. We need to send metrics about the goals we hope to achieve, and we have to partner across the whole site and the community, including our pharmaceutical and biotech sector partners. I see my job as figuring out, what are the barriers to making that happen. The talent is already there, it’s just about making the whole greater than the parts.
Q: Checkpoint inhibitors, which have made certain types of cancer such as melanoma much more survivable than they used to be, are good examples of transformative therapy that clinical trial participants had access to long before they became the new standard of care. What are other promising developments that you see on the horizon today?
A: As you say, advances in immunotherapy have been very, very successful in some diseases and in a subset of patients and have cured patients with advanced disease, which has been quite remarkable. We’re still trying to understand which therapies work with which patients and why, and there are a lot of very-exciting advancements still to come in immunotherapy, including (cancer) vaccines. I think we will also see advances in early detection, whether it is in terms of blood-based testing or in the use of (artificial intelligence) in areas like breast and lung imaging. CRISPR (a technology that has allowed much easier gene editing) is already seeing some very exciting trials for inborn diseases like sickle cell anemia, and some of that work will obviously extend into the cancer space.
Q: What do you wish every person with cancer knew?
A: I wish every person with cancer knew that they have options. Before you make an immediate decision about what you’re going to do, you should find out where there’s expertise and seek it out because, how you start your treatment is going to be very important for decisions down the road.
Q: Does it come down to allowing yourself a moment to get a second opinion?
A: Yes. I’ve actually done videos and written pieces for various nonprofits around the country on pancreatic cancer and the value of getting a second opinion and making sure that patients know they’re empowered to do what’s best for their own care.
Q: How will you understand what needs to change at Moores?
A: I think we need to talk to people in our community. What do we do really well? What can we do better? Are there things that are missing? Are there things that would make life easier for you? I always want to hear what went great and what didn’t.
