AliveAndKickn is pleased to announce two new additions to the AliveAndKickn Board, allowing us to continue the message of resilience and to continue to build AliveAndKickn into an international resource for individuals and families with Lynch syndrome hereditary cancer mutations.
AliveAndKickn is pleased to announce two new appointments to the Board of Directors. Tara Kirk Aldridge, Lynch syndrome individual and patient advocate and Dr. Jordan Karlitz, Director of the GI Hereditary Cancer Genetics Program at the Tulane University School of Medicine.
Tara Kirk Aldridge, was diagnosed with Lynch Syndrome in the summer of 2016. The Lynch diagnosis of the mutation MSH6 finally gave her family some answers to the string of cancers that had haunted them. Tara’s great grandmother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer age 40 and later colon, her mother passed away from lung cancer at 35, and her Aunt’s uterine cancer diagnosis in 2016. Tara is currently a previvor and is diligent in getting her cancer screenings at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, the same facility that treated her mother many years ago. Since learning of her diagnosis, she has become a passionate advocate for awareness, education and research related to Lynch syndrome and was AliveAndKickn’s 2018 Blue Genes Bash Honoree. She will be able to lend her advocacy experience, business and marketing skills to fundraising, planning and promotion of AliveAndKickn and the resources it offers Lynch syndrome patients.
Dr. Jordan Karlitz graduated from the University of California at Berkeley with a degree in molecular biology and genetics. He subsequently attended the McGill University Faculty of Medicine in Montreal where he received his medical degree. He received his internal medicine training at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons/New York Presbyterian Hospital and completed his fellowship in gastroenterology and hepatology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine/Montefiore Medical Center.
Dr. Karlitz joined the faculty at the Tulane University School of Medicine in the division of Gastroenterology in 2008 where he is currently an Associate Professor of Medicine. In 2010, he completed a preceptorship in IBD sponsored by the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America at the Massachusetts General Hospital. In 2011, he founded the Hereditary GI Cancer and Genetics Program at the Tulane Cancer Center, the first clinical program of its kind in Louisiana, of which he is director. He is also currently the Associate Program Director of the gastroenterology fellowship program at Tulane and the Fellowship Site Director at the VA.
Dr. Karlitz's clinical interests and research centers on familial colon cancer syndromes, including Lynch Syndrome. Through collaboration with the Louisiana Tumor Registry (LTR) based at the LSU School of public health (where he is an adjunct professor), Dr. Karlitz has been studying colorectal cancer incidence rates in Louisiana and nationally. Through his research, he has identified one of the highest rates of colorectal cancer in the U.S. in the Acadian parishes of Louisiana. Also through collaboration with the LTR, Dr. Karlitz has been studying population based Lynch Syndrome screening practices in young colorectal cancer patients. Through his affiliation with the LTR, Dr. Karlitz serves as the Physician Advisor for GI Cancers for the State Tumor Registry (SEER program).
Dr. Karlitz's Acadian parish colorectal cancer research has been presented at the American Gastroenterological Association's Digestive and Disease Week where he was a Poster of Distinction award winner. He also presented his population based Lynch Syndrome screening research at the Colorectal Cancer Prevention Plenary at the Annual American College of Gastroenterology (ACG) meeting in 2014 and was awarded the prestigious ACG Governors Award for Excellence in Clinical Research. He also won an ACG Presidential Poster Award in 2016 for his work in colon cancer genetics.
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