Biography

Dr. Rebecca Arend is an Associate Professor of Gynecology Oncology within the department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham as a surgeon-scientist providing oncologic care for patients with gynecologic cancer. She is a Scientist at the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center holding several key roles including Chair of the Data Safety and Monitoring Committee, Member of the Gynecology Oncology Working Group, Member of the Phase I Working Group, and Co-Chair of the Precision Oncology Working Group. Additionally, she was recently appointed as Medical Director of the Clinical Trial’s Office and Co-leader of the Experimental Therapeutics Program at the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Arend’s clinical interests include translational research, targeted therapy, chemoresistance, immunotherapy, and personalized medicine. She has been awarded funding for over six Investigator Initiated trials and has served as both the local and national Principal Investigator on multiple Phase II and III clinical trials. Dr. Arend was awarded a DOD Early Career Investigator Grant (W81XWH-18-1-0231) assessing the relationship between Wnt pathway and the expression signature of immune genes in clinical specimens from this study. She was also awarded the NCCN Young Investigator Award to study the role of TGF-b in immune suppression for ovarian cancer patients.

In addition to her service and awards as faculty at UAB she also serves on several committees and collaborates extensively with investigators at other institutions and within UAB. Dr. Arend is also the Co-Investigator at UAB for directing the Tissue CORE for the Cervical SPORE award where she works extensively with our Pathology department and Tissue Biorepository team to ensure that a portion of cervical cancer tissue and at least a vial of a patient’s blood is to be collected and banked for future research collaborations. She sits on multiple NCCN guidelines committees, which serve to ensure that all patients receive preventive, diagnostic, treatment, and supportive services that are most likely to lead to optimal outcomes. She supports the cervical, vulvar, vaginal, endometrial, and gestational trophoblastic disease panels. She is a translational research representative on the Ovarian Cancer Subcommittee for the NRG.