Richard Lee, MD, PhD is an oncologist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, MA where he sees patients, and he is also involved in community outreach activities.

Dr. Lee was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. He graduated AOA with MD and PhD (molecular biology) degrees at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, NY. After completing internal medicine training at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), he completed the hematology and oncology fellowship at the combined Dana-Farber / Harvard Cancer Care program, in Boston, MA. His post-doctoral research at MIT was on animal models of metastasis. He joined the medical oncology staff at Massachusetts General Hospital in 2007 and is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His research has been on biomarkers in genitourinary malignancies as well as clinical trials. Dr. Lee has served on the NCCN Prostate Cancer Guidelines Panel (2010-2018), including 2 years as Vice-Chair (2017-2018). He has received grant funding from the Prostate Cancer Foundation, Conquer Cancer Foundation, and Department of Defense.

Thaddeus Bell, MD has been a family doctor for over 45 years and is a passionate advocate and expert on health disparities. He runs a private practice in Charleston, South Carolina. As a solo practitioner with one office manager and no other staff, Dr. Bell not only sees and cares for patients, but he also is the one to call insurance companies when they deny his patients the care they need. “It’s a hassle to be on the telephone with insurance companies so often, getting prior authorization, telling health insurance companies why I want to do XYZ with my patient,” he said. “It takes a significant amount of time.” Most frustrating for Dr. Bell is when a patient changes insurance companies, and the new company wants the patient to get on cheaper medications than the ones that are already working for them. “I have to jump through hurdles to keep my patient on the medicine that works,” he said. “That doesn’t seem right.”

Angelo Moore, PhD, MSN, RN, NE-BC is the Assistant Director, Community Outreach, Engagement, and Equity (COEE), Duke Cancer Institute, where he provides overall direction, coordination, and implementation DCI’s community impact-designed projects to reduce cancer outcomes disparities in the DCI community and across its Catchment Area.  COEE goals are to: (1) Engage meaningfully, respectfully, and collaboratively with community partners, (2) Build strong, bi-directional partnerships between our community and DCI cancer researchers, and (3) Develop a multi-level, prospective data infrastructure to guide community-DCI partnerships.  The mission is to reduce cancer disparities and improve population health in DCI catchment area for historically marginalized and medically underserved populations such as the African American, Latinx, Asian American, Native American, Jewish, Muslim, LGBTQ+, refugee, and rural communities.

Dr. Moore leads the Community-Facing Navigation program at Duke Cancer Institute.  Duke Cancer Institute utilizes a longitudinal patient navigation multidisciplinary matrix model, which incorporates multiple patient navigation entities.  Within this longitudinal patient navigation multidisciplinary matrix, COEE has Community-Facing Patient Navigators, which is unique. These Community-Facing Patient Navigators are employees of the health care system, operate in the community, and trained by the Harold P. Freeman Patient Navigation Institute.  Some responsibilities include providing cancer education on prevention, early detection screening as well as navigating individuals needing cancer screenings, follow-up for abnormal screenings to diagnostic testing, and into treatment if diagnosed with cancer.  The uniqueness of being within the health care system allows these Community-Facing Navigators get patients to and through the health care system to maximize continuum of care.  He is a member of the National Navigation Roundtable Steering Committee.  He is also a member of the Evidence Based Promising Practices Task Group and the Membership Committee.

Wendy L. Poage earned her Bachelor of Science degree at the Colorado State University in 1993 and her Master of Health Care Administration at Webster University in 1997. Wendy has been the President of the Prostate Conditions Education Council since 1998 and the Administrator of Urologic Oncology at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center for over ten years.

Wendy’s vast experience with prostate cancer includes leadership positions in renowned educational institutions, hospitals, non-profits, and private practice settings. Her unique expertise and areas of interests include bridging the gap between patients, research and their medical providers, cause marketing for challenging demographics and building innovative national and international programs that are highly sought after by outside entities. Wendy actively participates in research and has a variety of publications including scientific abstracts and general magazine articles. Wendy has also been selected to serve with several affiliated non-profits around the country including her role as Vice President of the National Alliance for State Prostate Cancer Coalitions, Obadiah Cole Foundation, and the Prostate Cancer Roundtable. As a highly sought-after international consultant and resource, she speaks to both physician and patient groups including recent speaking engagement at the American Urological Association, the American Association of Clinical Chemistry, the International Prostate Cancer Update and the Future Directions in Urology Symposium.