OncoLog Volume 46, Number 02, February 2001

Specialized Training and Techniques of Pathologists Lead to Targeted Therapies Protocols: Studies Examine High-Dose Chemotherapy for Breast Cancer High-Dose Chemotherapy for Breast Cancer: Completion of Clinical Trials Necessary DiaLog: Many Specialties, One Goal, by Janet M. Bruner, MD, Chairman, Department of Pathology House Call: Support Groups Offer Patients a Helping Hand Study Reveals Types of Diagnostic Errors and Their Costshttps://openworks.mdanderson.org/oncolog/1093/thumbnail.jp

Janet M. Bruner, MD

https://openworks.mdanderson.org/legendsandlegacieschapters/1002/thumbnail.jp

Chapter 03: In Medical School

The next chapter begins as the Interviewer recaps Dr. Bruner\u27s educational track, providing institution names and dates. Dr. Bruner then explains the professional and personal reasons why she left Toledo for a medical school in Ann Arbor, then returned to study at the Medical College of Ohio. She covers her experiences in a unique, year-long student clerkship at the latter institution, and offers a moving anecdote about performing an autopsy on an elderly man who had been stabbed seventy times, an experience (among many) that convinced her she did not want to enter forensic pathology, as she first thought she might.https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1510/thumbnail.jp

Chapter 02: The Young Scientist and the Pathologist\u27s Eye

In the next chapter, Dr. Bruner sketches her love of science and her educational path. She notes her love of mysteries as a young person, and draws an analogy to pathologist as a detective solving the mystery of tissue. She traces her path to a pharmacy degree and then to medical school (as opposed to graduate school), explaining how she discovered pathology in her second year of medical training at the Medical College of Ohio, Toledo. She gives a very complete definition/description of a pathologist\u27s eye, on which good diagnostic capabilities rely. Dr. Bruner observes that today she sees fellows struggling to develop this eye some are able to develop it, others are not.https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1509/thumbnail.jp

Chapter 01: Neuropathology and MD Anderson\u27s Neuropathology Services

Dr. Bruner begins the first chapter with a brief overview of her field and clinical service. Few patients know what a neuropathologist does (even physicians can be unclear on the role). Dr. Bruner defines neuropathology and explains the neuropathologist\u27s activities and contributions to a patient\u27s diagnosis and care. She also describes the organization of MD Anderson\u27s neuropathology services, noting its strengths, some of the analyses performed (including a rapidly developing area of immunohistochemistry testing and gene-sequencing), and the methods of its accreditation.https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1508/thumbnail.jp

Janet M. Bruner, MD, Oral History Interview, June 7, 2012

Major Topics Covered: The Department of Pathology, subspecializing The Department of Hematopathology Women and leadership at MD Anderson Growth at MD Anderson, financial challenges, cultural changehttps://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewsessions/1085/thumbnail.jp

Chapter 20: A New Department: Hematopathology

Dr. Bruner sketches how she worked with Dr. Hamilton to set up (in 2002/3) the Department of Hematopathology, a very unusual structure that links Lymphoma and Leukemia (and that serves 1/3 of the patients at MD Anderson.) She touches on the Department\u27s fellowship training program.https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1527/thumbnail.jp

Chapter 13: Cultivating Leadership at MD Anderson

Here Dr. Bruner talks about leadership development at MD Anderson, beginning with the courses she took via the American College of Physician Executives. She notes that MD Anderson offered few opportunities for leadership training in the nineties, but that changed in early 2000, when the Office of Faculty Development hired the Executive Development Leadership Group to offer formal training. She talks about the courses offered and also describes how the pace of the first courses was too slow for MD Anderson\u27s high speed culture where minds move quickly. She then talks about the creation of the Faculty Leadership Academy (in 2002/3) whose goal was to offer a curriculum of basic leadership principles that faculty aren\u27t exposed to during professional training, but that are needed in most roles: supervisory skills, conflict resolution, evaluation, mentoring, hiring and firing, etc. At the end of this chapter, Dr. Bruner gives an example of a departmental dilemma requiring complex skillshttps://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1520/thumbnail.jp