Global Cancer Research and Control Seminar Series 2025 (Upcoming Webinars)

Stella Aguinaga Bialous, Dr.P.H., Lillian and Dudley Aldous Endowed Chair in Nursing Professor and Chair, Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences
School of Nursing, University of California San Francisco

Stella Aguinaga Bialous, Dr.P.H., is the Lillian and Dudley Aldous Endowed Chair in Nursing and Professor and Chair of the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the UCSF School of Nursing. In addition, she serves as a faculty member of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education and a member of the Global Cancer Program at the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Bialous completed her B.S.N. in Nursing at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, in her native Brazil, followed by an M.S. from the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing and an M.P.H. and Dr.PH. from the University of California, Berkeley.

With over 30 years of national and international experience in tobacco control policy development, evaluation, and implementation, she is a globally recognized expert in addressing the tobacco industry's interference with public health. For the past 25 years, Dr. Bialous has provided technical assistance to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Secretariat of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control across more than 20 countries. Her work includes over two decades of capacity building to support health providers’ engagement with tobacco dependence treatment and policy, with a specific focus on tobacco users who have been neglected by health care systems, such as people with a diagnosis of cancer, TB, living with HIV, and with substance use disorder. Building on her extensive analysis of tobacco industry documents, Dr. Bialous recently expanded her research into other harmful substances, including alcohol. In this role, she engages with researchers, advocates, and policymakers to understand how tobacco industry tactics are translated into other commercial determinants of health, furthering her lifelong commitment to global health equity.

Francesca Odhiambo M.B., Ch.B., M.Med., Senior Research Officer
Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI)

Francesca Odhiambo, M.D., is a physician and an assistant principal clinical research scientist at the Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), with extensive experience in leading clinical and implementation research in Kenya. She currently serves as a site principal investigator and co-investigator on multiple NIH-funded studies. These include a cluster-randomized controlled trial evaluating tobacco cessation among people with HIV (NCT05351606) and mSaada, a mobile health tool to improve cervical cancer screening in western Kenya (NCT05848557).

Informed by her 13 years of leadership directing PEPFAR-funded HIV programs in western Kenya, Dr. Odhiambo has well-established partnerships with the Ministry of Health to strengthen HIV service delivery. Her long-term goal is to generate rigorous, contextually grounded evidence that accelerates the translation of research into national guidelines, strengthens health systems, and reduces the growing burden of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) among people living with HIV. She is particularly committed to advancing equitable, sustainable models of integrated care, mentoring the next generation of African clinician-scientists, and fostering South–North research partnerships that build local capacity while influencing global HIV and cancer control agendas.

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Anant Madabhushi, Ph.D., Robert W. Woodruff Professor of Biomedical Engineering
Emory University

Anant Madabhushi, Ph.D., is the Robert W Woodruff Professor of Biomedical Engineering and serves on the faculty in the Departments of Pathology, Biomedical Informatics, Urology, Radiation Oncology, Radiology and Imaging Sciences, Global Health and Computer and Information Sciences at Emory University. He is also a Research Career Scientist at the Atlanta Veterans Administration Medical Center and serves as the inaugural executive director of the newly formed Emory Empathetic AI for Health Institute. Dr. Madabhushi has authored over 500 peer-reviewed publications and holds more than 225 either issued or pending patents in the areas of artificial intelligence, radiomics, medical image analysis, computer-aided diagnosis, and computer vision.

Dr. Madabhushi is a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), the Institute for Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), the American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the National Academy of Inventors (NAI). His work on "Smart Imaging Computers for Identifying Lung Cancer Patients Who Need Chemotherapy" was recognized by Prevention Magazine as one of the top 10 medical breakthroughs of 2018. In 2019, Nature Magazine hailed him as one of 5 scientists developing "offbeat and innovative approaches for cancer research." From 2019 to 2022, Dr. Madabhushi was named to The Pathologist’s Power List of 100 inspirational and influential professionals in pathology. He is also an entrepreneur, having founded three companies: Elucid Bioimaging, Ibris Inc., and Picture Health. In 2019, Elucid Bioimaging attained FDA approval for one of his technologies on the use of AI for carotid plaque characterization.

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Amr Soliman, M.D., Ph.D., Director, Cancer Epidemiology Education in Special Populations (CEESP) Program
City University of New York (CUNY) School of Medicine

Over the past 25 years, Dr. Amr Soliman has collaborated with faculty members in various global settings and special populations in the United States to develop a program in cancer epidemiology and translation to cancer prevention and control. This collaboration has led to the development and maintenance of strong research infrastructure in global settings and with several medical centers in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe to investigate the epidemiology of cancers relevant to the local sites. Dr. Soliman co-led the largest global research study on inflammatory breast cancer in North Africa, along with Dr. Catherine Schairer (retired) from the National Cancer Institute (NCI). He also co-led a project in Tanzania on HIV-related malignancies. His two global research studies have provided significant training opportunities to students and trainees from the United States and in global settings.

Over the past 20 years, Dr. Soliman has served as the principal investigator of the NCI-R25-supported Cancer Epidemiology Education in Special Populations (CEESP) program at the University of Michigan, the University of Nebraska, and City University of New York. The CEESP program has trained more than 250 public health and medical students in special populations. More than 98 percent of the CEESP alumni practice and conduct research in the United States after their global training.

Dr. Soliman has also conducted collaborative research with the minority-focused SEER registry in Detroit, MI; the Michigan Cancer Consortium; the State Cancer Registry of Michigan; and the Arab American Center for Social and Economic Services. He also conducted several research studies focused on underserved populations in Michigan, rural populations in Nebraska, and unique populations in New York. Dr. Soliman’s domestic research in the United States focuses on access to cancer care, screening, and early detection in underserved populations.

Dr. Soliman is the past president of the American Association for Cancer Education and the current editor-in-chief of the Journal of Cancer Education.

Nisreen Qatamish, Director General
King Hussein Cancer Foundation

Mrs. Nisreen Qatamish is a recognized leader in social development, philanthropy, and the advancement of women’s and youth issues. She currently serves as the Director General of the King Hussein Cancer Foundation (KHCF) in Jordan, the country's largest community-based nonprofit organization. Under Ms. Qatamish’s leadership, KHCF has solidified its position as a regional and international leader in cancer care. Mrs. Qatamish oversees fundraising and advocacy efforts, leads comprehensive communications and media strategies, fosters strong partnerships across the public and private sectors, and plays a key role in garnering government support for the Foundation. An advocate for long-term sustainability, Mrs. Qatamish has been instrumental in creating innovative financial strategies to secure the Foundation’s future. Notably, she spearheaded the establishment of the KHCF Endowment and led the development of a cancer insurance program, championing its nationwide expansion as a comprehensive and socially inclusive model for financing cancer treatment.
Mrs. Qatamish holds a bachelor’s degree in resource management and the environment from the University of Jordan. She has also completed specialized training in leadership, management, and policymaking at the American University of Beirut and the Harvard Kennedy School.

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