Edward Matthew Schaeffer

Personal profile

Research Interests

I am Chair of the Department of Urology at Feinberg School of Medicine and Program Director of the Genitourinary Oncology Program at the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University. My clinical and research focus is the diagnosis and treatment of men with prostate cancer. I have published more than 250 peer-reviewed publications emphasizing at-risk populations, diagnosis, treatment outcomes, and the molecular biology of lethal prostate cancer. My previous work has demonstrated that aggressive (high-risk), localized prostate cancer is frequently lethal and undertreated. I developed a molecular signature which identifies the most lethal prostate cancers, sometimes upwards of 10 years before the effects of the tumors are observed. I am now taking this work to the next level by modeling which chemotherapies and hormonal therapies could effectively treat these rare, aggressive tumors. My discoveries have greatly advanced the basic scientific understanding of biologic differences in prostate cancers in men of African descent. In recent work, I demonstrated a more aggressive biologic subset of cancers in African American men, which helps to explain why African American men are twice as likely to die from prostate cancer as Caucasian men. My team’s findings include distinctive anatomic locations of tumors in African American patients, molecular expression signatures of cancers in African American patients that demonstrate decreased reliance on androgen signaling, novel solid tumor gene fusions, and divergent biomarker panels signaling aggressive disease. I am continuing this work and hope to identify additional outliers in African American prostate cancers that impact metastatic disease risk.

Training Experience

2002	Internship, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
2007	Residency, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine

Education/Academic qualification

MD, PhD, The University of Chicago

… → 2001

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Grants

2 Finished
7 Active

Molecular profiles of African American men with localized prostate cancer

Schaeffer, E. M.

Urology Care Foundation, Inc.

8/1/19 → 7/31/20

Project: Research project

Clinical, Environmental, Genetic and Genomic profile of Men with Early Onset Lethal Prostate Cancer

Abdulkadir, S. A., Hussain, M., Jovanovic, B., Meeks, J. J., Morgans, A. K. & Schaeffer, E. M.

Prostate Cancer Foundation

12/31/17 → 12/31/20

Project: Research project

Investigating Long Noncoding RNAs as Biomarkers and Mediators of Prostate Cancer Progression in African American Men

Schaeffer, E. M.

University of California, San Francisco, U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command

9/30/17 → 9/29/20

Project: Research project

Creation and validation of a pre-biopsy nomogram for predicting high-risk prostate cancer in African American men

Jovanovic, B., Murphy, A. B., Schaeffer, E. M. & Yang, X. J.

U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command

9/15/17 → 9/14/20

Project: Research project

Prot #9785-MA-1010: A Randomized Study of Enzalutamide in Patients with Localized Prostate Cancer Undergoing Active Surveillance (ENACT)

Schaeffer, E. M.

inVentiv Health Clinical, Astellas Pharma Global Development, Inc.

8/17/17 → 8/17/20

Project: Research project