Dr. Robert Cameron is the Director of the Comprehensive Mesothelioma Program at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles and is widely considered one of the leading experts in the treatment of pleural mesothelioma. He is both a professor of surgery and a senior surgeon at UCLA and also serves as an advisor for the Pacific Mesothelioma Center.
One of Cameron’s biggest achievements is his development of the pleurectomy / decortication surgical procedure, which spares the lungs of mesothelioma patients who otherwise would have a lung removed. Patients who are generally healthy and physically fit enough to handle invasive surgery are good candidates for this procedure, which involves two main parts. The first is a pleurectomy, where the chest cavity is opened up and the surgeon removes portions of the lining of the affected lung(s). The second part, decortication, involves the removal of tumor growth inside the pleural lining.
Patients who receive the procedure, which Cameron has performed more than 300 times, typically have a longer life expectancy – ranging from nine to 19 months following surgery – than those who don’t. While there is no known cure for mesothelioma, Cameron’s goal with this procedure is to save the lung, remove as much as the tumor as possible, and treat mesothelioma as a chronic illness. In fact, he is outspoken in his opposition to the arguably radical practice of lung removal (extrapleural pneumonectomy, or EPP).
After his father, grandfathers, one uncle, and two cousins all died young (under the age of 55) from various cancers, Cameron decided to take action and work toward a cure. Quite simply, he was (and remains) determined to live a long life, despite the odds that his genetics have given him. When he first got into medicine, mesothelioma patients were given little hope of extending their lives or improving their quality of life, but he has made it his mission to offer some optimism (while being mindful not to give them false hope).
Cameron attended medical school at both the University of Michigan and UCLA (where he got his medical degree). After his second year, he obtained early membership to the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Society after his second year. After completing his degree, Cameron received training as a clinical associate in surgical oncology at the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland; a general surgery residency at UCLA; and a fellowship in cardiothoracic surgery at Cornell-New York Hospital and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York.
Cameron co-founded the Alexandria, Virginia-based Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation in 1999, the first medical research foundation focused solely on research into the diagnosis and treatment of mesothelioma. He has authored or co-authored a number of papers on oncology and thoracic surgery and has reviewed articles for Cancer Research, the Annals of Surgical Oncology, the Annals of Thoracic Surgery, the Journal of Immunology, and Journal of the National Cancer Institute, and other medical publications. In addition, he has written more than 38 medical book chapters, edited two medical textbooks, and has given several lectures on mesothelioma treatment and related matters.
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