Frits van Rhee

Richard R. Furman, MD is the Morton Coleman, M.D. Distinguished Professor of Medicine and director of CLL Research Center at Weill Cornell. He attended medical school at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine followed by Internal Medicine Residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He subsequently completed fellowship in Hematology and Oncology at Weill Cornell Medical College. After fellowship, Dr. Furman performed laboratory based research on cognate and non-cognate immune interactions in CLL, focusing on NF-kappaB and B cell differentiation. Dr. Furman subsequently left the laboratory to pursue clinical research and patient care with an interest on the development of non-chemotherapeutic approaches for the treatment of CLL and lymphomas. He initially focused on thalidomide and lenalidomide, before working on novel monoclonal antibodies, BCR antagonists, and other small molecule inhibitors. Dr. Furman has played a key role in the development of idelalisib, ibrutinib, acalabrutinib, and venetoclax, as well as understanding and treating mechansims of resistance.

I am a Professor of Medicine and Clinical Director of the UAMS Myeloma Center located on the campus of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. I earned my medical degree from Erasmus University, Rotterdam, Netherlands, and my Ph.D. at the Imperial College of Science, Medicine and Technology, University of London. I trained in Internal Medicine and Hematology in the United Kingdom, in Bone Marrow Transplantation at John Radcliffe University Hospital in Oxford and attended the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in London. Subsequently, I was a Fogarty Fellow at the National Institutes of Health.I hold the Charles and Clydene Scharlau Chair for Hematological Malignancies Research. Dr. van Rhee is an international expert on Castleman Disease, with one of the largest populations of Castleman Disease patients in the world. I am the co-founder of the Castleman Disease Collaborative Network (CDCN) and presently serve as the co-chair of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the CDCN. I was the principal investigator for all siltuximab studies including the phase II randomized trial leading to the worldwide approval of siltuximab for iMCD. I have published more than 50 scientific papers on Castleman Disease including the publication in the journal, Blood, which formulated the International, evidence-based consensus treatment guidelines for iMCD

Richard R. Furman, MD is the Morton Coleman, M.D. Distinguished Professor of Medicine and director of CLL Research Center at Weill Cornell. He attended medical school at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine followed by Internal Medicine Residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He subsequently completed fellowship in Hematology and Oncology at Weill Cornell Medical College. After fellowship, Dr. Furman performed laboratory based research on cognate and non-cognate immune interactions in CLL, focusing on NF-kappaB and B cell differentiation. Dr. Furman subsequently left the laboratory to pursue clinical research and patient care with an interest on the development of non-chemotherapeutic approaches for the treatment of CLL and lymphomas. He initially focused on thalidomide and lenalidomide, before working on novel monoclonal antibodies, BCR antagonists, and other small molecule inhibitors. Dr. Furman has played a key role in the development of idelalisib, ibrutinib, acalabrutinib, and venetoclax, as well as understanding and treating mechansims of resistance.

Dr. Barr is a Professor of Medicine at the University of Rochester and serves as Assistant Director for Clinical Research at the Wilmot Cancer Institute and Medical Director of the Wilmot Clinical Trials Office. Since his appointment as Medical Director in 2013, he has overseen substantial growth and specialization of the Clinical Trials Office, contributing to a doubling of clinical trial accrual.
Dr. Barr completed fellowship training in Hematology and Oncology at Case Western Reserve University, where he was also an NIH/NCI K12 Paul Calabresi Scholar. Clinical trials expertise was further developed through the American Society of Hematology Clinical Research Training Institute. He has since led single-institution, multi-center, and cooperative group studies evaluating novel agents for patients with non-Hodgkin lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia.
His research focuses on the clinical development of novel therapeutic combinations incorporating inhibitors targeting the B-cell receptor signaling pathway. This work has been supported by a Wilmot Fellowship, the University of Rochester NIH SPORE in Lymphoma, and a career development award from the Lymphoma Research Foundation. Dr. Barr is an active member of the SWOG Lymphoma Committee and has served as study chair for SWOG S1608 and Principal Investigator for SWOG S1108 and S0801. He also serves as the Rochester site PI for SWOG, is a member of the SWOG Board of Governors and serves as the PI for the Rochester’s Lead Academic Participating Site award from the NCI Clinical Trials Network in 2019, with renewal in 2026.

Dr. Nicole Lamanna serves as the Judy Horrigan Professor of Medicine and Director of the Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL) Program on the Leukemia Service for the Hematologic Malignancies Section in the Hematology/Oncology Division at Columbia University Medical Center. Dr. Lamanna specializes in the treatment of adult patients with acute and chronic leukemias with a focus on chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). Her clinical research focus has been the development of novel combination therapies that include immune-modulatory drugs, kinase inhibitors, bcl-2 inhibitors, monoclonal antibodies as well new agents in development for this disease. She is a staunch patient advocate and participates regularly in CLL patient advocacy groups with the goal of educating patients about their disease and treatment options. She has lectured and chaired CLL sessions at international and national meetings and has published in various scientific journals, including Blood, Journal of Clinical Oncology, Lancet and The New England Journal of Medicine.

I am a Professor of Medicine and Clinical Director of the UAMS Myeloma Center located on the campus of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. I earned my medical degree from Erasmus University, Rotterdam, Netherlands, and my Ph.D. at the Imperial College of Science, Medicine and Technology, University of London. I trained in Internal Medicine and Hematology in the United Kingdom, in Bone Marrow Transplantation at John Radcliffe University Hospital in Oxford and attended the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in London. Subsequently, I was a Fogarty Fellow at the National Institutes of Health.I hold the Charles and Clydene Scharlau Chair for Hematological Malignancies Research. Dr. van Rhee is an international expert on Castleman Disease, with one of the largest populations of Castleman Disease patients in the world. I am the co-founder of the Castleman Disease Collaborative Network (CDCN) and presently serve as the co-chair of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the CDCN. I was the principal investigator for all siltuximab studies including the phase II randomized trial leading to the worldwide approval of siltuximab for iMCD. I have published more than 50 scientific papers on Castleman Disease including the publication in the journal, Blood, which formulated the International, evidence-based consensus treatment guidelines for iMCD