The major leaps in clinical care are achieved through meticulously designed and executed clinical trials that either prove and disprove a benefit to a new intervention. As a laboratory of Clinical Research in the Department of Radiation Medicine, we study ways to improve the efficacy of radiation therapy –by investigating the role of RT in new areas, questioning the role of RT in other areas, learning to target RT more precisely with novel imaging modalities, determining how RT can be combined with novel systemic agents. Most of our prospective studies are done in collaboration with other departments. 

Below is the list of some of our studies in various phases of design, preparation, patient accrual and analysis:

• Adjuvant radiation therapy for patients with Dupuytren's Contractures after surgical or enzymatic release of advanced contractures
• Localization of involved regional lymph nodes with USPIO-MRI in Esophageal Cancer
• Localization of involved regional lymph nodes with USPIO-MRI in Rectal Cancer
• Addition of Bladder-directed radiation therapy to Immunotherapy in metastatic bladder cancer
• Combination of Conventionally and Hypofractionated Radiation Therapy with Immunotherapy in Stage II/III non-operable NSCLC
• Alternating Electric Fields as an Alternative to Prophylactic Cranial Irradiation in patients with Small Cell Lung Cancer
• Assessment of effect of Palliative Radiation Oncology (PRADO) clinic model on outcomes of patients with incurable malignancies.

The adoption of results of clinical trials in the real world is not immediate and may be hindered by lack of knowledge, financial and other barriers. We conduct National Cancer Data Base analyses to determine the patterns of treatments and outcomes for common malignancies where standard of care has been established through rigorous clinical trials, as well as rare conditions, in which clinical trials are not possible. 

Below is the list of NCDB projects we have conducted with our colleagues:

• Rectal Cancer (Cancer Journal)
• Gallbladder Cancer (Lancet)
• Breast Angiosarcoma

Despite clinical evidence from published clinical trials, the daily practice of medicine by providers may be in a stark contrast to established guidelines. Large retrospective population-based analysis cannot capture the most current views and practices of treating physicians. Survey-based analysis of current patterns of treatment, with evaluation of association of respondents' characteristics, knowledge base, allows us to determine the future direction for clinical trials.

Some of our survey-based analysis work is presented below:

• Seminoma   
• ES-SCLC   
• LS-SCLC   
• Prostate   
• Breast Angiosarcoma   
• Esophagus   
• Bladder   
• Rectal cancer

Wencesley Paez, M.D.

Dr. Paez began his first tenure at OHSU in 2008 working with  Dr. Bruce Wolfe on various industry and NIH-sponsored research trials, while also co-authoring peer-reviewed manuscripts. He was an OHSU President's Award Nominee and Rose Award recipient in 2011, and was a former Ted R. Lilly-Knight Cancer Institute CURE Program Research Mentor. He holds a Doctor of Medicine, and a BS in Biology with a Minor in Chemistry. 

December 3, 2019

Timur Mitin, M.D., Ph.D. and Daniel Spratt, M.D. wrote on prostate stereotactic body radiation therapy for December's ASTRO Blog titled The Future of Prostate Radiation Therapy in the Era of Bundled Payment: Less is more?

September 15, 2019

Timur Mitin, M.D., Ph.D. was a speaker at the Joint RUSSCO-ASTRO-SPRO Session on Palliative Radiation Therapy in Incurable Patients: Keeping Symptoms Down and Hope High at the 2019 ASTRO Annual Meeting in Chicago, Illinois.

May 21, 2019

Timur Mitin, M.D., Ph.D., medical director of the Tuality/OHSU Cancer Center was interviewed for by OHSU Blogs about a treatment option that will improve outcomes for patients with bladder cancer who cannot tolerate surgery or chemotherapy. Read about helping more bladder cancer patients preserve a functioning bladder.

November 13, 2018

Timur Mitin, M.D., Ph.D. was interviewed for the Cancer Network's article, The Verdict on IMRT Plus Doxorubicin in Unresectable Thyroid Cancer.

August 31, 2018

Timur Mitin, M.D., Ph.D. is co-PI of CRUK (Cancer Research UK)-OHSU/Cancer Early Detection Advanced Research Center (CEDAR) Spark Award for his proposal titled "Amplicon deep sequencing of urinary DNA for the early detection of recurrence following chemoradiotherapy for muscle-invasive bladder cancer ("AmpseqUr-RT"). The $20,000.00 grant award is based upon the novel hypothesis that earlier detection of recurrence in patients with muscle-invasive bladder cancer who have undergone chemoradiotherapy. As such, Dr. Mitin and his team will assess the diagnostic utility of AmpseqUR in this setting. AmpseqUr utilizes the commonest urothelial bladder cancer-associated somatic mutations and amplifies the loci of interest by multiplex PCR and identifies mutations by targeted next-generation sequencing of the amplicons. 

June 5, 2018

Timur Mitin, M.D., Ph.D. presented Prostate Radiotherapy in Newly-Diagnosed Metastatic Hormone-Sensitive Prostate Cancer at the 2018 ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago, Illinois.  

February 15, 2018

Timur Mitin, M.D., Ph.D., medical director of the Tuality/OHSU Cancer Center was interviewed for by OHSU Blogs  about applying the ProtecT Trial data to minority populations. The ProtecT trial is led by researchers at the Universities of Oxford and Bristol at nine centers in the United Kingdom.

May 9, 2016

Dr. Timur Mitin, with the assistance of Dr. Shushan Rana, has received a 2016-17 Research Seed Grant from the RSNA Research & Education Foundation from the Radiology Research Faculty Grant Study Section for his application titled "Novel Imaging of Lymph Nodes in Patients with Rectal Cancer Using Ferumoxytol-enhanced MRI". Congratulations to Drs. Mitin and Rana.

March 21, 2015

Drs. Timur Mitin and Alex Guimaraes are co-PIs of the 2015 Michael J. Newton Esophageal Cancer Research award from the Newton Foundation Esophageal Cancer Translational Research Program. The grant is titled, “Novel Imaging of Lymph Nodes in Patients with Esophageal Cancer Using Ferumoxytol-enhanced Magnetic Resonance Imaging”.

2021

Society for palliative radiation oncology: report from the Seventh Annual Meeting (2020). Johnstone C, Martin EJ, Mitin T, Tseng YD, Hill J, Simone CB 2nd.Ann Palliat Med. 2021 Jun 17:apm-2021-03. doi: 10.21037/apm-2021-03. Online ahead of print.PMID: 34154365 Free article.

A multidisciplinary central nervous system clinic model for radiation oncology and neurosurgery (RADIANS): three-year experience with brain and skull base lesions in a community hospital setting. Paez WA, Gheewala R, McClelland 3rd S, Lucke-Wold B, Jaboin JJ, Thomas Jr CR, Mitin T, Ciporen JN.J Neurosurg Sci. 2021 May 3. doi: 10.23736/S0390-5616.21.05304-2. Online ahead of print.PMID: 33940778

Doubly Hypofractionate. Mitin T.Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2021 Mar 15;109(4):847-848. doi:  10.1016/j.ijrobp.2020.04.005. PMID: 33610301 No abstract available.

Patterns of Care and Barriers to Utilization of Definitive Concurrent Chemoradiation Therapy for Stage III Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer in Russia. Dengina N, Chernykh M, Degnin C, Chen Y, Tsimafeyeu I, Karaseva VV, Tjulandin S, Laktionov K, Thomas CR Jr, Mitin T.J Cancer Educ. 2021 Feb 2. doi: 10.1007/s13187-021-01966-8. Online ahead of print.PMID: 33533013

Three-Year Experience of a Multidisciplinary Central Nervous System Clinic Model for Radiation Oncology and Neurosurgery (RADIANS) in a Community Hospital Setting. Paez W, Gheewala R, McClelland S, Jaboin JJ, Thomas CR Jr, Lucke-Wold B, Ciporen JN, Mitin T.Gen Med Clin Pract. 2021;4(1):042. Epub 2021 Apr 16. PMID: 34142091 Free PMC article.

Executive Summary of the American Radium Society Appropriate Use Criteria for Radiation Treatment of Node-Negative Muscle Invasive Bladder Cancer. Dinh TT, Mitin T, Bagshaw HP, Hoffman KE, Hwang C, Jeffrey Karnes R, Kishan AU, Liauw SL, Lloyd S, Potters L, Showalter TN, Taira AV, Vapiwala N, Zaorsky NG, D'Amico AV, Nguyen PL, Davis BJ.Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2021 Mar 15;109(4):953-963. doi: 10.1016/j.ijrobp.2020.10.031. Epub 2020 Oct 27.PMID: 33127490 Review.

Photons, Protons, SBRT, Brachytherapy- What is leading the charge for the management of prostate cancer? A Perspective From the GU Editorial Team. Choudhury, A, Henry, A, Mitin, T, Chen, R, Joseph, N & Spratt, D 2021, International Journal of Radiation: Oncology - Biology - Physics. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.IJROBP.2021.01.003

2020

Prostate Cancer Radiation Therapy Recommendations in Response to COVID-19. Zaorsky NG, Yu JB, McBride SM, Dess RT, Jackson WC, Mahal BA, Chen R, Choudhury A, Henry A, Syndikus I, Mitin T, Tree A, Kishan AU, Spratt DE.Adv Radiat Oncol. 2020 Oct 29;5(Suppl 1):26-32. doi: 10.1016/j.adro.2020.10.003. eCollection 2020 Nov. 

Flattening the curve of prostate cancer progression: accurate detection and safe ablation. Mitin T, Choudhury A. International Journal of Radiation: Oncology - Biology - Physics. 2020 Apr 20. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.IJROBP.2020.04.028

Early Postoperative Mortality Among Patients Aged 75 Years or Older With Stage II/III Rectal Cancer. Sineshaw HM, Yabroff KR, Tsikitis VL, Jemal A, Mitin T. J Natl Compr Canc Netw. 2020 Apr;18(4):443-451. doi: 10.6004/jnccn.2019.7377.

Prostate Cancer Radiotherapy Recommendations in Response to COVID-19. Zaorsky NG, Yu JB, McBride SM, Dess RT, Jackson WC, Mahal BA, Chen R, Choudhury A, Henry A, Syndikus I, Mitin T, Tree A, Kishan AU, Spratt DE. Advances in Radiation Oncology (2020), doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adro.2020.03.010.

Radiation oncology should be a partner to medical oncology in end-of-life care. McClelland S 3rd, Mitin T.Rep Pract Oncol Radiother. 2020 Mar-Apr;25(2):155-156. doi: 10.1016/j.rpor.2020.01.003. Epub 2020 Jan 14.

Management of Muscle Invasive Bladder Cancer with Bladder Preservation in Russia: a Survey-Based Analysis of Current Practice and the Impact of an Educational Workshop on Clinical Expertise. Mitin T, Dengina N, Chernykh M, Usychkin S, Gladkov O, Degnin C, Chen Y, Nosov D, Tsimafeyeu I, Thomas CR Jr, Tjulandin S.J Cancer Educ. 2020 Mar 4. doi: 10.1007/s13187-020-01728-y.

2019

SBRT for Localized Prostate Cancer: Is it Ready for Take-Off? Mitin T, Henry A, Choudhury A, Chen RC, Pinkawa M, Spratt DE. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2019 Nov 1;105(3):618-620. doi: 10.1016/j.ijrobp.2019.07.008. No abstract available.

Enhancing Career Paths for Tomorrow's Radiation Oncologists. Vapiwala N, Thomas CR Jr, Grover S, Yap ML, Mitin T, Shulman LN, Gospodarowicz MK, Longo J, Petereit DG, Ennis RD, Hayman JA, Rodin D, Buchsbaum JC, Vikram B, Abdel-Wahab M, Epstein AH, Okunieff P, Goldwein J, Kupelian P, Weidhaas JB, Tucker MA, Boice JD Jr, Fuller CD, Thompson RF, Trister AD, Formenti SC, Barcellos-Hoff MH, Jones J, Dharmarajan KV, Zietman AL, Coleman CN. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2019 Sep 1;105(1):52-63. doi: 10.1016/j.ijrobp.2019.05.025. Epub 2019 May 22. Review.

The role of biomarkers in bladder preservation management of muscle-invasive bladder cancer. Mitin T, Choudhury A. World J Urol. 2019 Sep;37(9):1767-1772. doi: 10.1007/s00345-018-2480-7. Epub 2018 Sep 14.

Evolving Practice Patterns in the Use of Prophylactic Cranial Irradiation for Extensive-Stage Small Cell Lung Cancer. Gjyshi O, Ludmir EB, Pezzi TA, Boyce-Fappiano D, Dursteler AE, Mitin T, Lin SH. JAMA Netw Open. 2019 Aug 2;2(8):e199135. doi: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2019.9135. 

Adjuvant vs. salvage radiation therapy in men with high-risk features after radical prostatectomy: Survey of North American genitourinary expert radiation oncologists. McClelland S 3rd, Sandler KA, Degnin C, Chen Y, Mitin T. Can Urol Assoc J. 2019 May;13(5):E132-E134. doi: 10.5489/cuaj.5470. 

Dramatic polarization in genitourinary expert opinions regarding the clinical utility of positron emission tomography (PET) imaging in prostate cancer. Sandler KA, McClelland S 3rd, Degnin C, Chen Y, Mitin T. Int Braz J Urol. 2019 Jan-Feb;45(1):23-31. doi: 10.1590/S1677-5538.IBJU.2018.0208.

Postoperative Radiation Therapy in Localized Prostate Cancer: When, How Much, and How Fast? Mitin T, Nguyen PL. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2019 Feb 1;103(2):289-292. doi: 10.1016/j.ijrobp.2018.08.003.