PHILIP ADIB SALEM, M.D.
BIOGRAPHY & BIBLIOGRAPHY
Philip Adib Salem, M.D. is a world renowned cancer physician, researcher, educator, author and international medical statesman. He served on the faculty
of the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas as aprofessor of cancer medicine from 1987 to 1991. In 1991, Dr. Salemwas appointed
Director of Cancer Research St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in Houston, Texas, now known as theBaylor St. Luke’s Medical Center, CHI St. Luke’s Health, where he is currently Director Emeritus of Cancer Research. Also in 1991, Dr. Salem established the Salem Oncology Center, a private cancer facility in the Texas Medical Center in Houston, Texas, where he continues to serve as President.In 2010, St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital established the Philip A. Salem Chair in Cancer Researchto honor Dr. Salem’s contributions to cancer medicine. Dr. Salemhas published extensively on Immunoproliferative Small Intestinal Disease and the causative relationship ofinfection to cancer. His research was also crucial in the development of new anticancer agents.
In addition to being a cancer physician and researcher, Dr. Salem is a renaissance intellectual and author. He has extensively published on Lebanese and Middle Eastern Affairs, and he has also written articles ranging from religion to philosophyto human rights. He advanced the concept that the most sacred human right is the right to health. There are nine books that have been written about him and his vision.
Family life and education
Philip Adib Salem was born in Bterram, El-Koura, NorthLebanon on July 13, 1941 to Adib Salem and Lamia Malik. He has five brothers and one sister. Dr. Salem and his wife were married in 1973 and have two daughters and a son.
Dr. Salem completed his elementary and secondary education in El Koura, Lebanon. At the age of 16, he matriculated to the American University of Beirut where, in 1961, he earned a Bachelor of Science degree. In 1965, He graduated with a Doctor of Medicine degree from the School of Medicine of theAmerican University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.After graduating from medical school, Dr. Salem completed 3 years of residency in Internal Medicine at the American University of Beirut Medical Center.
In 1968, Dr. Salem began a fellowship in medicaloncology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, New York. After two years in New York,hemoved to Houston, Texasforan additional year of trainingat the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center.
Dr. Salem as an academician
In 1971, Dr. Salem returned to Lebanon and joined the full time faculty of the American University of Beirut Medical CenterasAssistant Professor and founding Director of the Cancer Research and Treatment Program.In 1978, he was promoted to Associate Professor of Medicine.
In 1987, hereturned to the United States and joined the faculty of the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas as an Associate Professor of Medicine in the Department of Medical Oncology. In 1990, he was promoted to Professor of Medicine.
In 1991, Dr. Salem was appointed Director of Cancer Research at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in Houston, Texas. Also in the same year, he was appointed Adjunct Professor of Medicine at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, a position he held until 2000. During his tenure in academic medicine, Dr. Salem served on numerous institutional governance committees.
In 2010, St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital, now known as the Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center, CHI St. Luke’s Health, established the Philip A. Salem Chair in Cancer Research “as a lasting tribute to his leadership and vision in the field of oncology.” Dr. Salem continues to hold this chair today.In 2012, and after 20 years of being Director of Cancer Research, Dr. Salem was named Director Emeritus.
Dr. Salem as a Physician
During his career, Dr. Salem has treated thousands of cancer patients around the world. Above all else, Dr. Salem considers himselfa physician. He embraces the philosophy that, in the practice of medicine, doctors treat people not diseases. Dr. Salem leads the struggle torehumanize cancer treatment in America and the world. He believes that knowledge alone is not enough. In addition, patients need love, care, hope, compassion,accessibility to the doctor, and time to talk about their fears, anxieties, and concerns.
Dr. Salemalso champions a movement to prohibit government and insurance providers from interfering in the decision making process inthe diagnosis and treatment of cancer. He strongly believes that the doctor should have the liberty to treat patients as he thinks is best and be able to practice without fear of litigation for failure to comply with arbitrary standards and guidelines that may not be appropriate for every patient.
Dr. Salem as a Researcher
Dr. Salem’s research focused on three major areas:Immunoproliferative Small Intestinal Disease (IPSID), lymphomas other than IPSID, and new agents and new treatments in cancer.
In the early 1970s, while at the American University of Beirut Medical Center, Dr. Salemdescribed IPSIDas a disease of the small intestine. He demonstrated that a chronic repetitive infectious insult to the gastrointestinal mucosa may eventually lead to inflammatory changes, which, if left untreated, may progress to malignancy.
Dr. Salem and his team also elucidated the process through which histopathologically benign lesions progress to malignancy and described the benign phase of IPSID.He demonstrated that the process of inflammation resulting from a chronic repetitive infectious insult is potentially reversible before it becomes malignant. Dr. Salem and his team showed that if IPSID patients are treated with antibiotics while still in the benign phase, the pathology in the small intestine can be reversed to normal, preventing the transition to cancer. This research was one of the first demonstrations of chemoprevention – the reversal of the neoplastic process prior to progression to malignancy.
In 2005, the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology went to 2 Australian researchers, Drs. Barry J. Marshall and J. Robin Warren, who demonstrated the link between infection withH. pylori and peptic ulcer and stomach cancer. In the citation, the Nobel Prize Committee recognizedthe contributions of prior work in this area, including the IPSID research of Dr. Salem, as a gateway for the research that captured the Nobel Prize.
Dr. Salem and his team have also done extensive research on lymphomas in the Middle East. He has delineated the distinctive features of lymphomas in the Middle East and elucidated how lymphomas in the Middle East differ from those seen in the West. He demonstrated that many lymphomas in the Middle East are extra-nodal, with the intestinal forms being the most common. His team also showed that follicular lymphoma is rare in the Middle East and that the most common lymphoma in children there is Burkitt’s lymphoma.
Dr. Salem also developed a new method for the deliveryof the cancer drug Cisplatinum that substantially reduced its toxicity to the kidney. Instead of giving the whole dose of the drug in one injection, Dr. Salemand his team fractionated the dose over five days. This fractionation was useful in helping patients tolerate the drug and in protecting the kidney from irreversible damage. This work served as the basis for the Cisplatinum dosing protocols that are currently used around the world, and for the fractionation of the dose of another cancer drug, Adriamycin.
Additionally, Dr. Salem has explored the efficacy of administering anti-cancer agents directly to the liver through intra-arterial hepatic infusion. This work demonstrated success in treating liver cancer including primary and metastatic liver cancer.
Dr. Salem has also been an active participant in clinical trials on chemoprevention of cancer. He was the Principal Investigator at St. Luke’s Hospitalfor a nationalstudy investigating the use of Tamoxifen andRaloxifene inpreventing breast cancer in high risk women. He also participated in studies investigating the use of Cis-retinoic Acid, a synthetic form of vitamin A, in the prevention of lung, and head and neck cancers. He continues to conduct research in this area.
Dr. Salem as an Educator
In addition to his roles as a physician and researcher, Dr. Salem has also been an educator. While at the American University of Beirut Medical Center in the 1970’s, Dr. Salem established the first fellowship training program in cancer treatment and research in the Middle East.
Throughout his career, Dr. Salem trained hundreds of medical students, residents and fellows. He also coordinated and chaired multidisciplinary tumor conferences at the various hospitals at which he worked, and he participated in hundreds of conferences around the world on cancer research and treatment. He considers public and professional education is key to the conquest of cancer.
Dr. Salem as an Author and subject of books
The following books have been published: Click to view