Dr. Sophia George is Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center’s (SCCC) inaugural associate director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). Dr. George is the Principal
Investigator (PI) of the George lab, which highlights the disparities in outcomes for minority populations in the U.S., Africa, and the Caribbean with breast and High-Grade Serous Carcinoma (HGSC). While both Black and White women are diagnosed with HGSC and breast cancer at similar rates, Black women are more likely to die from the cancers. Dr.George is the Co-PI of the Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), a study that seeks to understand the early events of cancers of the breast, prostate, and Fallopian Tube Epithelia (FTE). Additionally, Dr.George is the Co-PI of the Pfizer-funded African Cancer Genome Registry (ACGR), a study to understand genomic characteristics of breast and prostate cancer in Black and Hispanic men and women.
Dr. George spent the summer in Nigeria engaging with collaborators on the CZI grant, to instruct on collecting, processing, and shipping tissue. Dr. George and her colleagues have been invited by the Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Health Sciences Azare Bauchi State, Prof Bala Audu, to be on an Institute of Oncology Committee to advise on the development of the oncology program at the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University Teaching Hospital in Bauchi (ATBUTH). The picture above displays Dr. George with a group of collaborators at ATBUTH. In May 2023, Dr.George hosted the University of Miami and Nigerian Convening to foster collaboration between Nigerian health institutions and SCCC. Since starting her faculty position at the University of Miami in 2015, Dr.George has mentored dozens of students who have since completed medical school, residencies, Ph.D. programs, and many other professional programs and careers across the nation. Dr.George will continue to work towards closing the gaps and lessening the disparities in cancer
