Alexandria Carolan is a reporter with The Cancer Letter and associate editor of the Cancer History Project. She joined the publication in 2019.
Her work focuses on a wide range of oncology issues including appropriations, diversity and, most recently, gender-related bias.
Alexandria has worked as an editorial associate at the American Society of Clinical Oncology, where she wrote for The ASCO Daily News, and edited ASCO Educational Book and meeting programs. Alexandria holds a B.A. in journalism and English from the University of Maryland (2018), where she wrote for the university’s independent student newspaper, The Diamondback.
She has written for local newspapers and magazines, where she covered city affairs, crime, science and technology, and bias. Alex’s work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Associated Press, Capital News Service, Asbury Park Press, Bethesda Beat and Bethesda Magazine.
Her work focuses on a wide range of oncology issues including appropriations, diversity and, most recently, gender-related bias.
Alexandria has worked as an editorial associate at the American Society of Clinical Oncology, where she wrote for The ASCO Daily News, and edited ASCO Educational Book and meeting programs. Alexandria holds a B.A. in journalism and English from the University of Maryland (2018), where she wrote for the university’s independent student newspaper, The Diamondback.
She has written for local newspapers and magazines, where she covered city affairs, crime, science and technology, and bias. Alex’s work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Associated Press, Capital News Service, Asbury Park Press, Bethesda Beat and Bethesda Magazine.
Latest Stories
In the Archives
When Stephanie Graff was a breast oncology fellow in 2010, one of her patients brought a marked up copy of “Dr. Susan Love’s Breast Book” to an appointment.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Soon after he was diagnosed with a dedifferentiated liposarcoma, C. Norman Coleman reached out to The Cancer Letter and the Cancer History Project to initiate a series of interviews about his life and career.
By Otis W. Brawley, Alexandria Carolan and Paul Goldberg
White House
President Joe Biden has requested an increase of $871.5 million to the overall NIH budget in FY25. Of that amount, $522 million, or nearly 60%, is slated for NCI.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
As a new deputy director at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, Monica Baskin has assumed a level of responsibility that is unusual, if not unprecedented, for a population scientist at an NCI-designated cancer center.
By Robert A. Winn, Paul Goldberg and Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
On her first day of medical school at the University of Virginia in 1963, Vivian Pinn waited for the other students who looked like her to show up.
By Robert A. Winn and Alexandria Carolan
Free
A cruel reminder crept in alongside the joy that overcame Shauna Erickson-Abou Zahr and Abdallah Abou Zahr at the birth of their daughter, Nadia Carmel, on Jan. 11.
By Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
As a student at MIT in the 1970s, Roderic Pettigrew was writing his PhD thesis on how a controlled nuclear reaction in the brain, boron neutron activation therapy, could be used to treat glioblastoma multiforme.
By Robert A. Winn and Alexandria Carolan
Capitol Hill
As NCI continues to hobble along on a flat budget provided by a succession of continuing resolutions, the prospects for robust funding for cancer research, rising paylines, and healthy cancer center support grants have dimmed for this fiscal year. “The extended delay in passing the FY2024 budget is disastrous for our cancer centers,” Jennifer W....
By Alexandria Carolan
NCI Director's Report
As the likelihood of a flat budget increases for the 2024 fiscal year, NCI will have difficulty maintaining its current programs, the institute’s new director Kimryn Rathmell said in her inaugural NCI director’s report to members of the National Cancer Advisory Board Feb. 8.
By Alexandria Carolan
Regulatory News
FDA has directed the sponsors of CAR T-cell therapies to place boxed warnings on their products to indicate that the agents may cause secondary T-cell malignancies.
By Alexandria Carolan
Obituary
Edith P. Mitchell, a medical oncologist, champion of health equity, and the first woman physician to attain the rank of U.S. Air Force brigadier general, died unexpectedly Jan. 21. She was 76.
By Alexandria Carolan
Obituary
Sidney Wolfe, a physician who co-founded the Health Research Group, and—as a pioneer of “research-based advocacy”—took pharmaceutical companies to task over bad drugs, often shaming federal regulators into changing policies for the benefit of patients, died Jan. 1 in Washington. He was 86.
By Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
In 1964, the Office of the Surgeon General issued a report on smoking and health that ended a debate that had raged for decades—stating that cigarettes cause lung cancer and other diseases.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
We think of the compilation of The Cancer Letter’s most-read stories as an end-of-year snapshot of oncology’s priorities.
By Alexandria Carolan and Katie Goldberg
Free
What drew Jim Allison to T cells, Hagop Kantarjian to leukemia, or Betty Ford and Nancy Reagan to breast cancer advocacy?
By Alexandria Carolan and Katie Goldberg
Alec Kimmelman was named director of the Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Cancer Center, effective immediately.
By Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
George SantosGeorge Santos, founder of Johns Hopkins University Bone Marrow Transplantation Program, pioneered many of the innovations used in bone marrow transplantation that are relevant today—but he didn’t get nearly as much credit as others working in the field.
By Alexandria Carolan
Capitol Hill
Monica Bertagnolli testifies during her Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee confirmation hearing to be the next NIH Director, Oct. 18, 2023 Photo credit: Kevin Dietsch/Getty ImagesA Senate Committee Oct. 25 voted 15-6 to advance the confirmation of Monica Bertagnolli to the role of NIH director.
By Alexandria Carolan
Capitol Hill
At a Senate hearing that considered her nomination to the post of NIH director, Monica Bertagnolli laid out an agenda that includes expanding access to clinical trials and making health care innovation affordable and accessible to the public.
By Alexandria Carolan
NCI Director's Report
Amid the gridlock that has seized Washington, NCI faces a grim and disturbing FY2024, the institute’s Principal Deputy Director Douglas R. Lowy said at the annual meeting of the Association of American Cancer Institutes.
By Alexandria Carolan and Paul Goldberg
As Robert A. Winn begins his two-year term as president of the Association of American Cancer Institutes, his presidential initiative of “Inclusive Excellence” aims to increase collaboration among cancer centers, their communities, and other cancer organizations in the United States and abroad.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
OK, name a movie doctor—fast!Chances are, you are thinking of Robin Williams as Patch Adams in the eponymous flick or of Harrison Ford as Dr. Richard Kimble in “The Fugitive.”
By Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
At 75, Chris Lundy is one of the longest living recipients of a bone marrow transplant.
By Deborah Doroshow and Alexandria Carolan
Free
More than 500 legislative proposals in 49 states are targeting trans people—predominantly youths—prompting fear among patients, healthcare providers, advocates, and legal experts that trans and gender nonconforming patients will be excluded from care.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
When John Laszlo joined the Acute Leukemia Service at NCI in 1956, the field of oncology was nascent—and the cure for childhood leukemia seemed beyond reach.
By Alexandria Carolan and Paul Goldberg
At first glance, the United States Supreme Court’s 303 Creative LLC. v. Elenis ruling has nothing to do with health care—but, looking deeper, experts in oncology and law are sounding alarms that the decision can be used to discriminate against LGBTQ+ patients.
By Alexandria Carolan
White House
The White House has awarded NCI $50 million to establish five centers for cancer control research in persistent poverty areas.
By Alexandria Carolan
The NCI Board of Scientific Advisors unanimously approved five new concepts and 25 reissued concepts at a meeting June 13-15.
By Alexandria Carolan
NCI Director's Report
The probability of NCI receiving a boost in funds over the next two years is slim, NCI Director Monica Bertagnolli said at the joint meeting of the National Cancer Advisory Board and Board of Scientific Advisors June 14.
By Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
NCI Director Monica Bertagnolli remembers when Betty Ford and Nancy Reagan went public with their breast cancer diagnoses—and the profound impact those decisions had on oncology.
By Alexandria Carolan
Conversation with The Cancer Letter
Throughout Jim Allison’s early career, the field of oncology appeared to be unfazed by his T cell research. Allison’s introduction to the now-famed immune cell came in an undergraduate immunology course, where even the professor was apprehensive about Allison’s fascination with the recently discovered T cells. “I remember going to see the professor after class...
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
When Kay Dickersin was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1986, the support group available to her in Baltimore focused largely on how to get the makeup and wig to look right.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
2022 was the year to try to return to normal—or at least an approximation thereof.
By Alexandria Carolan and Katie Goldberg
Free
The Cancer History Project preserves legacies, stories, and transcripts.
By Alexandria Carolan and Katie Goldberg
Free
Shortly after Craig Jordan finished his PhD in the 1970s, he was invited by Michael Harper to work at the Worcester Foundation, the “home of the oral contraceptive.”
By Alexandria Carolan
Conversation with The Cancer Letter
In the late 1960s, NCI received the modern-day equivalent of billions of dollars to establish a viral oncology program. At the time, the study of the role viruses played in cancer (or whether they played any role at all) was unknown. This could have been either a triumph or a huge and embarrassing waste of...
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
As Hurricane Ian approached Florida and meteorologists predicted landfall near the Tampa Bay area, cancer hospitals in the area prepared for the worst—a direct hit by a Category 4 storm.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Dwight Tosh had grown so weak that he was unable to walk. Still, doctors at the rural Arkansas hospital—where he lay in bed for weeks in 1962—were unable to diagnose him.
By Deborah Doroshow and Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
As Jerome Yates reflects on starting up the University of Vermont Cancer Center in the early 1970s, he quotes Joe Simone: “When you’ve seen one cancer center, you’ve seen one cancer center.”
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
When Jill Hawkins realized that she was six weeks pregnant this March, her oncologist gave her two options.
By Alexandria Carolan and Alice Tracey
In the Archives
At 25, Elizabeth Carner was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer.
By Deborah Doroshow and Alexandria Carolan
Free
The ASCO annual meeting began in 1964 as a group of 51 physicians finalizing the bylaws of the organization—and has since turned into a much-anticipated global event that brings together 35,000 to 40,000 people across all areas of oncology.
By Alexandria Carolan and Katie Goldberg
Free
When Judy Orem learned of her chronic myeloid leukemia diagnosis in 1995, she chose interferon over a treatment that seemed more risky—a bone marrow transplant.
By Deborah Doroshow and Alexandria Carolan
In the Archives
“Jim Allison: Breakthrough,” a documentary released in 2019, tells the story of 2018 Nobel Prize winner Jim Allison’s quest to cure cancer and the development of ipilimumab.
By Alexandria Carolan
Cancer History Project
In a panel discussion this week, five leaders in oncology proposed an action plan for tackling cancer health disparities and enhancing health equity.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
In a panel discussion this week, four cancer centers directors described how their experiences as immigrants have shaped their approach to oncology and the U.S. healthcare system.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Carol Fabian recalls the emotional hardship that came with treating women for breast cancer in the 1970s and eighties.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
A band of “Cancer Cowboys” once known as the ALGB—Acute Leukemia Group B—are, in large part, responsible for flipping the mortality rate of childhood leukemia from 90% to 10%, where it stands today.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
A panel convened by the Cancer History Project for Black History Month started with a discussion of mentorship, and concluded with a big underlying concept—justice.
By Alexandria Carolan and Alice Tracey
COVID-19 & Cancer
As omicron infections and hospitalizations continue to peak in the U.S., a high-stakes battle over the national public health response is being fought in the rafters of political Washington.
By Matthew Bin Han Ong, Alexandria Carolan and Alice Tracey
Free
The National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship began in 1986 with 23 people at a hotel in Albuquerque and a $100 contribution from Patricia A. Ganz, who recalls thinking: “I don’t think I’ve ever invested in anything that was so good.”
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
When Susan Love joked that a group of breast cancer advocates in Salt Lake City should march topless to George H. W. Bush’s White House, she didn’t expect to be taken seriously.
By Alexandria Carolan
Conversation with The Cancer Letter
Matthew Zachary, a 25-year cancer survivor and founder of Stupid Cancer, didn’t always know what it meant to be a cancer advocate, or the complex and rich history behind the term.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Fran Visco never asked for $300 million in breast cancer research funding—she demanded it.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Directors of the first three NCI-designated Comprehensive Cancer Centers are learning from the past, starting with the National Cancer Act, and mapping an equitable future for oncology.
By Katie Goldberg and Alexandria Carolan
Capitol Hill
The FY22 budget proposed by the White House doesn’t include sufficient funds to sustainably support NCI researchers, even though the proposal includes the largest ever funding increase for NIH, the American Association for Cancer Research said in a letter to House appropriators.
By Alexandria Carolan
From 2015 to 2018, the overall cancer death rate in the United States fell by 2.3% per year for men and 2.1% per year for women—an unprecedented drop, led by accelerated decline in deaths from lung cancer and melanoma.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
The NCI Board of Scientific Advisors approved four new concepts, which includes Requests for Applications, Cooperative Agreements, and Program Announcements.
By Alexandria Carolan
NCI Director's Report
True, President Joe Biden is proposing the largest-ever funding increase for NIH, with a substantial percentage of funds going toward cancer.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
It took Narjust Duma a long time to feel like she belonged in medicine in the U.S. Here is her story.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Inappropriate sexual relationships of the sort Axel Grothey engaged in at Mayo Clinic may be all too common.
By Alexandria Carolan and Paul Goldberg
Free
The aftermath of sexual misconduct at premier medical institutions rarely leaves visible traces: HR is brought in, confidentiality invoked, deals made. The case of Axel Grothey’s exit from Mayo Clinic is a notable exception.
By Alexandria Carolan and Paul Goldberg
White House
In an expression of support for increasing funding for cancer research and prevention, the Bidens earlier this week endorsed the National Cancer Research Month.
By Matthew Bin Han Ong and Alexandria Carolan
Capitol Hill
NCI needs more funding to increase its low success rate of NCI-funded grant applications, David A. Tuveson said in testimony before the House Committee on Appropriations.
By Alexandria Carolan
Film & TV
Gynecologic oncologist Sarah Temkin has observed and experienced sexism in many venues: in hospital inpatient units, in the clinic infusion site, in the emergency room, but nothing is more blatant than sexism in the operating room.
By Alexandria Carolan
COVID-19 & Cancer
In surveys, as many as 15% of Americans say that they will not get a COVID-19 vaccine under any circumstances, and another 17% are in the “wait-and-see” category, holding out to observe how others fare.If these numbers are correct, the U.S. has almost no wiggle room as it strives to reach herd immunity to COVID-19.
By Alexandria Carolan
Health Disparities
We are shocked and horrified by the recent spate of violence and hate crimes against people of Asian and Pacific Islander descent across the United States.In response to these events, The Cancer Letter is stepping up coverage of inequities and disparities—and we are seeking your help and guidance on an upcoming series of investigative stories.As a publication that actively advocates for racial justice and health equity, we condemn these attacks, which have led to deaths, severe injuries, and widespread fear in AAPI communities.
By Matthew Bin Han Ong, Alexandria Carolan, Katie Goldberg and Paul Goldberg
The likelihood that a patient walking through the doors of a radiation oncology clinic has advanced disease has increased since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, a survey from the American Society for Radiation Oncology found.
By Alexandria Carolan
The NCI Board of Scientific Advisors approved 12 new and reissue concepts.
By Alexandria Carolan
NCI Director's Report
NCI has established a program at Frederick National Laboratory to manufacture CAR T-cell therapies for multicenter clinical trials.
By Alexandria Carolan
Once an expensive cancer drug is discarded, it’s not worth it for drug developers, health care providers, and payers to recoup its cost, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine said in a congressionally mandated report.
By Alexandria Carolan
COVID-19 & Cancer
In a matter of months, cancer researchers have gone from grappling with a surge of COVID-19 with limited clinical data to playing a critical role in the development of successful mRNA vaccines against the disease.
By Alexandria Carolan
COVID-19 & Cancer
Faced with a pandemic that kills thousands of Americans each day, FDA leadership had to get therapeutics and vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 onto the market with unprecedented speed without sacrificing standards.
By Alexandria Carolan
NCI Director's Report
Pandemic notwithstanding, NCI is on track to reach the 15th percentile for the payline by 2025—a goal set by institute Director Ned Sharpless in response to a deluge of grant applications.
By Alexandria Carolan and Matthew Bin Han Ong
Overall cancer mortality rates in the United States continued to drop precipitously, falling by 2.4% from 2017-2018, according to the American Cancer Society's latest Cancer Statistics report.
By Alexandria Carolan and Matthew Bin Han Ong
The NCI Board of Scientific Advisors has approved 10 new and reissued concepts.
By Alexandria Carolan
In a first procedural move of its kind, NCI asked its Board of Scientific Advisors to endorse the institute's continuing affiliation with the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research, a Federally Funded Research and Development Center.
By Alexandria Carolan and Matthew Bin Han Ong
NCI Director's Report
NCI has joined a nationwide initiative to increase the number of underrepresented minority faculty at NIH-funded cancer hospitals.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
The United States faces the worst-yet surge of COVID-19, but cancer hospitals have learned to adapt to the pandemic, opting to continue cancer services at an unchanged pace.
By Alexandria Carolan
After receiving a stage 4 colon cancer diagnosis, author Ibram X. Kendi sought consultation at two hospitals located a mile apart.
By Alexandria Carolan
COVID-19 & Cancer
In March, COVID-19 threatened to bring research at cancer centers to a halt.
By Alexandria Carolan
NCI Director's Report
NCI plans to mark the 50th anniversary of the National Cancer Act of 1971 with an effort to build a coalition of support for cancer research, including raising the payline to 15% by 2025.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
NCI has awarded 25 grants and contracts as part of the Serological Sciences Network initiative.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Women in oncology who face gender bias know what not to do: seek help from their institutions.
By Alexandria Carolan, Katie Goldberg and Matthew Bin Han Ong
Free
Leonidas C. Platanias spoke with Alexandria Carolan, a reporter with The Cancer Letter:
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
Pamela Kunz said she left Stanford School of Medicine because of years of gender-related microaggressions and verbal abuse she experienced there.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
This story is part of The Cancer Letter's ongoing coverage of COVID-19's impact on oncology. A full list of our coverage is available here.This year's Cancer Progress Report from the American Association for Cancer Research provides a chilling overview of the impact COVID-19 has had on cancer.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
NIH Director Francis S. Collins said he expects at least one of the vaccines against COVID-19 to be proven safe and effective by the end of 2020.
By Alexandria Carolan
Earlier this summer, NCI Director Ned Sharpless faced a big challenge: produce a video for kids with cancer at Camp Fantastic.
By Alexandria Carolan
Budget increases in 2020 enabled NCI to boost funding for research project grants, pushing the payline up by two percentage points from last year's level.
By Alexandria Carolan and Paul Goldberg
Free
The Senate appropriations subcommittee July 27 proposed a fifth COVID-19 pandemic relief package that includes $15.5 billion in supplemental funds for NIH.
By Alexandria Carolan
COVID-19 & Cancer
Adjusting to the pandemic, NCI has developed shortcuts in the conduct of clinical trials that could make it easier to conduct clinical trials, NCI Principal Deputy Director Douglas Lowy said at the virtual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research on COVID-19 and Cancer.
By Alexandria Carolan
COVID-19 & Cancer
If non-profit organizations are unable to make good on their commitments to trainees, NCI is prepared to fill that gap, NCI Director Ned Sharpless said during a July 22 virtual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research on COVID-19 and Cancer.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
In early March, when Giuseppe Curigliano, an oncologist in Milan, first spoke with The Cancer Letter about COVID-19, the situation in Italy was “like being in a war zone.”
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
A conference organized by the American Association for Cancer Research July 20-22 will bring together oncologists from academia, industry and government to identify ways for cancer researchers to inform studies of COVID-19.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
The NCI Board of Scientific Advisors has approved nine new and reissue concepts—Request for Applications, Cooperative Agreement, Request for Proposals, and Program Announcements with special receipt, referral and review.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
In March, as SARS-CoV-2 spread rapidly across the United States, cancer researchers scrambled to find clues about the virus and ways to mitigate its damage.
By Alexandria Carolan
Free
The name of the session was a message in and of itself: “Racism and Racial Inequalities in Cancer Research.”
By Alexandria Carolan
