Positions
Professor of Epidemiology
Chief, Depatment of Epidemiology
Director, Cancer Surveillance Program of Orange County and San Diego/Imperial Organization for Cancer Control
Professor, Microbiology & Molecular Genetics

Degrees
Ph.D. St. Andrews University, Scotland, UK
B.Pharm. University of Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt

Research Summary
Dr. Hoda Anton-Culver is Professor and Chair of the Department of Epidemiology, School of Medicine at the University of California, Irvine. She received her baccalaureate degree in pharmaceutical chemistry from the University of Alexandria in Egypt in 1964 followed by a Ph.D. in Epidemiology and Biochemistry at St. Andrews University, Scotland in 1968. Following her doctoral degree, she began her academic career as a Lecturer at McGill University Medical School, Canada. Then from 1971 to 1978, she joined Dr. Henry Lynch as an Assistant and then Associate Professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health at Creighton University School of Medicine, Nebraska. Since 1978, she has been at the University of California, Irvine as an Associate Professor and then as Professor and currently as the Chair of the Department of Epidemiology. She also holds a joint appointment with the School of Social Ecology at UC Irvine, and, an adjunct appointment with the San Diego State University Graduate School of Public Health. Dr. Anton-Culver is also the founder and Director of the Cancer Surveillance Programs of Orange, San Diego and Imperial Counties, a population-based cancer registry. This Regional Cancer Registry is the model registry for the California Statewide Cancer Reporting System created by legislative mandate in 1983. The Cancer Surveillance Program provides a focus for scientists, clinicians, and members of the healthcare community to promote cancer prevention and control.

During the past twenty years at UCI, Dr. Anton-Culver has established a major research program in cancer epidemiology and genetics. Under her leadership, the Department of Epidemiology is currently conducting several research studies in cancer epidemiology funded by the National Cancer Institute and other agencies. One study combines techniques in genetic epidemiology and molecular markers to define and characterize inherited breast/ovarian cancer in the population of Orange County. Another focuses on colon and rectum cancers to study the effects of genetic influence on the FCC genes as they interact with diet, physical activity, and other factors that may influence the risk for colorectal cancer.

She has recently been awarded several significant awards in cancer genetics from the National Cancer Institute. These awards will integrate the leadership and talent of investigators in cancer genetics, epidemiology and community research. The "UCI-UCSD Cancer Genetics Network" (U24 CA78134, Anton-Culver) establishes UCI as one of eight new interdisciplinary Cancer Genetics Networks that will provide the infrastructure for research investigations of the genetic basis of human cancer susceptibility and identify means to address the public health issues associated with human cancer genetics. The "NCI Cancer Genetics Network Informatics Center at UCI" (U01 CA78285, Anton-Culver) supports the cooperative of Cancer Genetics Networks as the sole Informatics Center responsible for the design, implementation, and maintenance of an information management system that supports the Network-wide research protocols. The Informatics Center will also be responsible for developing information systems that facilitate the exchange of human cancer genetics information and resources within the larger cancer genetics community. The "NCI Cooperative Family Registry for Breast and Colon Cancer Studies (CFRBCCS) Informatics Center at UCI" (U01 CA78296, Anton-Culver) represents an interdisciplinary and international consortium of participating centers of excellence in clinical and human genetics and epidemiology. The CFRBCCS serves as a research infrastructure by linking the collective scientific expertise of the collaborating centers with study populations through a central registry of participating families, and providing access to scientific expertise beyond the scope of a single institution or organization. UCI, as the CFRBCCS Informatics Center, will assist the CFRBCCS investigators to assure the establishment, management and continuing quality of the CFRBCCS databases, including epidemiologic, clinical and repository-related information; provide the technical expertise for the development of key information technologies, statistical methodology and study design that will be integral to the development of the next generation of cancer genetics studies; and provide the technical expertise and training to the CFRBCCS necessary to develop, implement and maintain a central informatics system that facilitates the goals of the CFRBCCS and is secure and confidential. These four five-year cooperative agreements totaling almost $11 million will establish for UCI a position of national leadership in the future of cancer genetics research and medical informatics.

The "Hereditary Breast Cancer: Genetic and Molecular Studies" (2 U01 CA58860, Anton-Culver) has also been renewed for an additional five years. The competitive renewal application will maintain and followup the existing family resource of 1270 breast and 262 ovarian cancer probands, further characterize BRCA mutations in breast and ovarian cancer families and explore the associated functions of BRCA1 missense mutations. In addition, the investigators will determine whether there is molecular genetic evidence for the aggregation of breast and colorectal cancer in a subgroup of the existing high risk breast cancer families. There is strong familial and molecular genetic evidence of an association between breast and ovarian cancer and also a familial association between breast and colon cancer. Further, preliminary results show mutations in MSH2 and MLH1 in breast cancer families where there is colon cancer in first or second degree relatives. The candidate genes (such as mismatch repair genes) relevant to the tumor spectrum in these families in addition to BRCA1 and BRCA2 will be examined and possible new genetic alterations will be explored. The data generated from the proposed study will have yield novel and important information to the scientific and clinical community as well as for subjects from breast cancer families possessing the diverse spectrum of tumors as is often observed in familial breast cancer. The "Breast and Other Cancers in the California Teacher's Cohort" (NCI, Wright) has also received recent approval. A cohort of 133,000 California school teachers had been established by a collaborative group of epidemiological investigators with the goal of evaluating unresolved issues related to breast cancer risk factors. UCI investigators Anton-Culver and Lin will assess modification of breast cancer risk by other risk factors in women with and without a family history of breast and other cancers. Specifically, they will a) evaluate the modifying effects of reproductive and hormonal factors (age at onset of menarche, age at first full-term pregnancy, weight, oral contraceptive use, and use of hormone replacement therapy); b) evaluate the modifying effects of dietary risk and physical activity; and c) assess whether risk modification in women with a family history of breast or other cancers is related to age at onset of breast cancer. Additionally, they will conduct a validation study of self-reported family history of cancer by cancer type and by family relationships of affected individuals. A major focus will be breast and ovarian cancer, but long-range goals of the CTS cohort will include familial and genetic studies of other cancers including malignant melanoma, endometrial cancer, and colorectal cancer. Therefore, the investigators will: a) evaluate the validity of family history data collected from self-reports by the cancer type and family relationship (degree of closeness to the proband) in a sample of the CTS cohort who reported in the baseline questionnaire a positive family history of breast cancer in at least one first-degree relative. Comparisons will be made between data provided by the baseline questionnaire and details from in-person interviews, medical records, and death certificates. An innovative cancer control program that could revolutionize the approach to cervix cancer prevention, Single-Visit Cervical Cancer Prevention Program (R01 CA76502, Manetta), has recently been launched by Community Research investigators. A significant barrier to the diagnosis and management of cervical cancer is the loss to follow-up for those who undergo screening using the Pap smear. In addition, other barriers include lack of education, cultural-based attitudes and health behaviors, as well as, socioeconomic factors. The usual approach to cervix cancer screening diagnosis and management is seen as accentuating these problems due to loss to follow-up and these barriers. This intervention study will determine the effectiveness of a single-visit program (SVP), including the diagnosis and treatment of patients with pre-malignant conditions, in decreasing the rate of loss to follow-up of women with abnormal Pap smears. The specific aims are to implement and evaluate the SVP for cervix cancer prevention in clinics serving a multi-ethnic population of women; and 2) to evaluate the SVP in terms of follow-up rates for abnormal Pap smears, patient satisfaction, and cost- effectiveness. If successful, the proposed program will markedly decrease the proportion of women who have Pap smears and are lost to follow-up and thereby decrease the rates if invasive cervix cancer. Moreover, the program could be transported to communities in the United States and to other countries around the world where the incidence and mortality rates of this malignancy are increased. Dr. Anton-Culver also serves on scientific review committees for the National Cancer Institute including membership on the National Action Plan on Breast Cancer, the Cooperative Family Registry for Breast and Colorectal Cancer, and the Central Brain Tumor Registry of the United States. Dr. Anton-Culver has also served as a Boardmember of the Orange County Region of the American Cancer Society for the past eighteen years, serving as President for three years.

She is also Associate Director of Cancer Control Research at the NCI-designated UCI Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, and has established a large outreach program to the professional and lay community on the prevention and control of cancer in the community. Additionally, she is involved in international training, working with the Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population to establish a Clinical Fellowship in Women's Health, as well as, a cancer registry training program to be held in September 1998, in Cairo, Egypt. She also collaborates with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to plan a similar cancer registry training program in Oaxaca, Mexico.

1. Bernstein L, Allen M, Anton-Culver H, Deapen D, Horn-Ross PL, Peel D, Pinder R, Reynolds P, Sullivan-Halley J, West D, Wright W, Ziogas A, Ross RK. High breast cancer incidence rates among California teachers: results from the California Teachers Study. Cancer Causes Control 2002, 13:625-35.
2. Theuer CP, Kurosaki T, Ziogas A, Butler J, Anton-Culver h. Asian patients with gastric carcinoma in the United States exhibit unique clinical features and superior overall anad cancer specific survival rates. Cancer 2000, 80:1883-92.
3. Peel D, Ziogas A, Fox E, Gildea M, Laham B, Clements E, Kolodner R, Anton-Culver H. Characterization of hereditary nonpolyposis colorectal cancer families from a population-based series of colorectal cancer. J Natl Cancer Inst 2000, 92:1517-22.
4. Anton-Culver H, Cohen PF, Gildea ME, Ziogas A. Characteristics of BRCA1 mutations in a population-based series of breast and ovarian cancer. Euro J Cancer 2000, 36:1200-08.
5. Ziogas A, Gildea M, Cohen P, Bringman D, Taylor T, Seminara D, Barker D, Casey G, Haile R, Liao SY, Thomas D, Noble B, Kurosaki T, Anton-Culver H. Cancer risk estimates for family members of a population-based family registry for breast and ovarian cancer. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2000, 9:103-11.