Cameroon Native Emily Baiyee Toegel, MD, Brings International Perspective to Her Gastrointestinal Cancer Work

A childhood in Cameroon and medical faculty in Germany helped kind the worldly method to most cancers care and analysis taken by University of Colorado Cancer Center member Emily Baiye ToegelMD.

“I grew up in Cameroon till late teenage age, and after highschool I moved to Germany and began medical faculty,” says Toegel, assistant professor of medical oncology on the CU Division of Medication. “There, they don’t have a pre-med-type diploma. In case you’re doing medication, you begin medication from the primary 12 months. You do six years and 9 months of coaching, and once you’re performed, you are performed along with your medical diploma.”

Toegel’s curiosity in a profession in medication began when she was in highschool, impressed by her biology lessons in addition to a cousin who died from leukemia at an early age.

“In Cameroon, the lessons in human biology are nearly like the start of studying anatomy, and that fascinated me,” she says. “We talked extensively about what the physiology of the human physique seems to be like, and that was the principle cause I wished to enter medication.”

Intro to oncology

Toegel labored half time at a nursing dwelling throughout medical faculty and even returned to Cameroon for considered one of her electives, however aside from that she was centered on her medical schooling. She printed two papers on immunology as a pupil, starting a love of analysis that has continued all through her profession.

“It confirmed me how I might couple what I used to be studying in medication with physiology and analysis, and in that sense, attempt to not solely enhance affected person care, but in addition advance medication by analysis,” she says. “I knew that for the remainder of my life, I wished be capable to present look after sufferers however at all times have analysis as a part of my coaching.”

Toegel got here to the U.S. for her residency, working at Tufts College College of Medication in Massachusetts. It was there that she took a severe curiosity in oncology, due to a breast most cancers oncologist she labored with carefully.

“She was very compassionate. I appreciated her fashion,” Toegel says. “She knew that you would have powerful encounters, however she loved spending time with the sufferers. That made me really feel like, ‘Yeah, that is what I need to do long run.’

It was additionally in Boston that Toegel started her work within the area of outcomes analysis in neuroendocrine tumors— finding out the last word outcomes of remedies for the situation. It’s work she plans to proceed on the CU Most cancers Middle utilizing the Flatiron database, a know-how platform that gives real-world scientific knowledge collected from the digital well being information utilized by most cancers care suppliers throughout america.

Along with providing its researchers entry to the database, the CU Most cancers Middle provides its affected person knowledge to the platform.

“Our final objective is to supply our sufferers customized care that’s efficient and is nicely tolerated,” Toegel says. “By way of the info we get from outcomes analysis, we will fine-tune the kind of remedies we provide, and we will determine the mutations that point out sufferers will reply to a selected remedy.”

Coming to Colorado

After Tufts, Toegel went to Boston College for her fellowship, working beneath a program director who specialised in gastrointestinal (GI) oncology and sparked Toegel’s curiosity within the area. On the lookout for a change of scene after her fellowship, Toegel got here to Denver in 2019, serving to to construct the GI oncology program at one other Denver Metro hospital earlier than coming to the CU Most cancers Middle and the CU College of Medication in 2023.

As a part of the GI oncology program on the CU Most cancers Middle, Toegel treats sufferers with neuroendocrine tumors, pancreatic cancerbile duct cancers, and colorectal cancers. Taking a cue from her mentor at Tufts, she spends a lot of her time specializing in sufferers.

“I actually love interacting with them,” she says. “It’s not nearly caring for sufferers, so far as their illness, however extra holistically. I at all times inform sufferers that, ‘Your loved ones is a part of the image.’ My objective is to make this actually, actually onerous expertise as tolerable as doable and to supply all of them the assist we now have.

“That’s one factor I actually like about working on the CU Most cancers Middle, is that I will provide them so many choices so far as assist,” she continues. “We have now affected person navigators who work with them, we now have nurses who’re at all times out there to sufferers — once they attain out with questions, they get a response fairly rapidly.”

Educational benefit

Although she loved her first few years in Colorado, Toegel says, she appreciated having the ability to return to an instructional medical setting just like the one on the College of Colorado.

“I used to be in an instructional middle in Boston, and over time I began to overlook that. I missed having the ability to deal with one space,” she says, including that one side of the medical expertise she enjoys is working with trainees together with medical college students, residents, and fellows.

“I really like working with residents and fellows, as a result of they at all times ask questions that get you pondering or provide you with a unique perspective,” she says. “Even after I was in Boston, I labored with residents and fellows. That was at all times an ideal expertise.”

Lower than a 12 months into her place as assistant professor of medical oncology, Toegel feels at dwelling on the CU Most cancers Middle — and grateful to be a part of a supportive crew of most cancers consultants.

“The good energy of this program is that I am related to mentors who’re there to information me to attain my analysis and profession targets,” she says.