Allan Tsung, MD gives his 2019 SUS Presidential Address “Maintaining the Passion”.
Allan Tsung, MD is a Professor and Chief of Surgical Oncology at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. Dr. Tsung’s clinical interests center on evaluating and managing patients with liver, bile duct and pancreas cancers, with expertise in laparoscopic and robotic surgery. He has a research laboratory focused on the hypothesis that inflammatory responses can alter the local microenvironment, leading to cancer progression via tumor cell survival, expansion and metastases. His research also evaluates the contribution of molecular markers in the diagnosis and clinical management of patients with hepatobiliary and pancreas cancers and projects focusing on improving the access, delivery and quality of surgical oncology care. Dr. Tsung’s work has generated 180+ published peer-reviewed manuscripts in leading scientific journals and culminated in multiple principal investigator NIH R01 grants and many society and institutional grants. His long-term goal is to continue bringing bench side research breakthroughs to bedside clinical therapies. As an advocate for medical students, general surgery residents and surgical oncology fellows, Dr. Tsung previously oversaw the strategic development of an outstanding surgical research program when he served as Vice Chair of Research for the Department of Surgery at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. He is the current president of the Society of University Surgeons and participates in leadership roles in several other important academic surgical organizations, such as the Society of Surgical Oncology, the Society of Asian Academic Surgeons, the Americas Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association and the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.