2025 Liver Cancer Symposium Agenda
SALCS 2025: celebrating 5 years!
October 9 - 11, 2025, San Antonio, Texas
Thursday, October 9, 2025
| 7 - 7:50 am | Registration, Breakfast, and Exhibits |
| 7:55 - 8 am | Welcome and Introductions Lei Zheng, MD, PhD, Executive Director of Mays Cancer Center at UT Health San Antonio. Sukeshi Arora, MD, symposium co-chair, associate professor in the Division of Hematology and Medical Oncology at The University of Texas at San Antonio, and leader of the gastrointestinal malignancies and geriatric oncology program at Mays Cancer Center. Danielle Fritze, MD, symposium co-chair and Associate Professor/Clinical of Surgery and holder of the Valero President’s Distinguished Chair in Transplantation at University of Texas at San Antonio. |
| Session 1 Epidemiology of Liver Cancer Moderator: Amelie Ramirez, MD, Mays Cancer Center at UT Health San Antonio | |
| 8 - 8:25 am | Texas at the Epicenter: Updated Epidemiology of Liver Cancer's Multi-Factor Dynamics Edgar Munoz, UT Health San Antonio |
| 8:25 - 8:50 am | Prevalence and Etiology of Liver Cancer in Rio Grande Subhash Chauhan, UT Rio Grande Valley School of Medicine |
| 8:50 - 9:15 am | Texas Collaborative Center for Hepatocellular Cancer Hashem El-Serag, Baylor College of Medicine |
| 9:15 - 9:35 am | Q&A |
| 9:35 - 10:10 am | Break, Networking, and Exhibition |
| Session 2 Year in Review Rapid Fire: Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC) Moderator: Sukeshi Arora | |
| 10:10 - 10:30 am | Imaging Diagnostics Venkata S. Katabathina, UT San Antonio |
| 10:30 - 10:50 am | Medical Highlights in Hepatology: What's New in 2025 Fred Poordad, UT San Antonio |
| 10:50 - 11:10 am | Hepatocellular Carcinoma - IR Updates Rajeev Suri, UT San Antonio |
| 11:10 - 11:30 am | Radiation Oncology Updates Neil Newman, UT San Antonio |
| 11:30 -11:50 am | Surgical/Transplant Oncology Karim Harazun, NYU Langone Health, New York |
| 11:50 am - 12:10 pm | Current advances and future outlook of Immunotherapy integration across early- and late-stage HCC Ahmed Kaseb, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston |
| 12:10 - 1:30 pm | LUNCH |
| 12:40 - 1:25 pm | Product Theater Natera |
| Session 3 Top 3 Oral Abstracts Moderator: Danielle Fritze | |
| 1:30 -1:45 pm | Molecular Profile of Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC) in older versus young adults receiving tyrosine kinase inhibitors: Does Age Matter? Jay Parekh |
| 1:45 - 2 pm | Remodeling the immune "cold" Hepatocellular Carcinoma Tumor Microenvironment with PH102: An Armed CAR T cell therapy VIncent Pham |
| 2 - 2:15 pm | Safety results from the Phase 3b SIERRA study of durvalumab (D) and tremelimumab (T) as first-line treatment for Hepatocellular Carcinoma participants with poor prognosis Adam Burgoyne |
| 2:15 - 2:30 pm | MAFLD-Derived FGF21 Drives Gallbladder Cancer Liver Metastasis via CAF-Secreted IGF2 and splicing reprogramming Cheng Zhao |
| Session 4 Tumor Board: Metastases to Liver Case Discussions Moderator: Richard Tuli, MD, PhD, Professor and Chair of Radiation Oncology at University of South Florida Panel: Amy Le, Nicolas Vathuey, and Karim Halazun | |
| 2:30 - 3 pm | Case 1: Neuroendocrine tumor with liver metastases |
| 3 - 3:30 pm | Case 2 Colorectal cancer with bilobar liver-only metastases |
| 3:30 - 3:45 pm | Break, Networking, and Exhibition |
Session 5 Survivorship: Living with Liver Cancer Moderators: Sherri Cervantez, MD, UT Health San Antonio Mays Cancer Center, and Michael Halpern, PhD, MD, MPH, UT San Antonio | |
| 3:45 - 4:05 | Symptom Support for Patients with Liver Cancer Sherri Cervantez, UT Health San Antonio Mays Cancer Center |
| 4:05 - 4:25 pm | Cancer Cachexia and the role of rehabilitation Madeline Flores, UT Health San Antonio Mays Cancer Center |
| 4:25 - 4:45 pm | Survivorship and Transplantation Jennifer Milton, UT Health San Antonio |
| 4:45 - 5 pm | Patient Advocate Story Jerry Drennan |
| 5 - 5:15 pm | Q&A |
| 5:15 pm | Day 1 Adjourns |
Friday October 10, 2025
| 7 - 8 am | Registration, Breakfast, and Exhibits |
Session 6 Plenary Speaker: Milind Javle, MD, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas Moderator: Sukeshi Arora | |
| 8:45 - 9 am | Q&A |
Session 7 Pre-Clinical and Translational Science of Liver Tumors Moderators: LuZhe Sun, PhD, UT Health San Antonio, and Peng Zhao, MD, PhD, UT Health San Antonio | |
| 9 - 9:20 am | Risk prediction and prevention of hepatocellular carcinoma Yujin Hoshida, UT Southwestern Medical Center |
| 9:20 - 9:40 am | Targeting MASH to prevent HCC Peng Zhao, UT Health San Antonio |
| 9:40 - 10 am | Immunotherapeutic barriers in the hepatic tumor microenvironment Won Jin Ho, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins Medicine |
| 10 - 10:20 am | Targeting LIPA to induce Endoplasmic Reticulum stress: Innovative HCC Therapy Ratna Vadlamudi, UT Health San Antonio |
| 10:20 - 10:40 am | Q&A |
| 10:40 - 10:55 am | Break, Networking, and Exhibition |
Session 8 Cholangiocarcinoma: Present and Future Moderator: Prabhleen Chahal, MD, MASGE, FACG, AGAF, UT Health San Antonio | |
| 10:55 - 11:15 am | Diagnostics - Advanced Endoscopy Matheus Franco, UT Health San Antonio |
| 11:15 - 11:35 am | Radiation Therapy for Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma: Expanding the Noninvasive Toolbox Smith “Jim” Apisarnthanarax, University of Washington |
| 11:35 - 11:55 am | Surgery - Multi-modal approaches to intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma Timothy Pawlik, Ohio State University |
| 11:55 am - 12:15 pm | Q&A |
| 12:15 - 1:30 pm | Lunch |
| 12:30 - 1:30 pm | Breakout Session: Advanced Practice Provider Session Moderators: Kathy Crow, and Jake Sekula |
| 12:45 - 1:30 pm | Product Theater: Ipsen |
| 1:30 - 2 pm | Break, Networking & Exhibits |
Session 9 Liver Tumor Board: HCC Outside Milan - Road to Transplant Moderator: Michael Cullen, National Cancer Institute; Jan Petrasek, UT Health San Antonio Panel: Maen Abdelrahim, Houston Methodist Neal Cancer Center Andrew Chesley, UT Health San Antonio James Welsh, MD Anderson Cancer Center Tarunjeet S Klair, UT Health San Antonio | |
| 2 pm - 2:30 pm | Case 1: Using Low-dose XRT for the treatment of liver tumors |
| 2 :30 - 3 pm | Case 2: CPI in liver transplant recipients - Salvage/Pallative therapy |
| 3 - 3:30 pm | Case 3: Adjuvant Immunotheraphy After Transplant |
| 3:30 - 5:15 p.m. | Poster Reception |
| 5:15 p.m. | Day 2 Adjourns |
Saturday, October 11, 2025: Update in Diagnostics and Management of Pancreatic Tumors
| 7 - 8 am | Registration and Breakfast Product Theater - Caris Life |
| 8 - 8:30 am | Session 1 - Diagnostics for pancreas tumors Moderator: Danielle Fritze Arriving at a Diagnosis: Overcoming Challenges in Characterization of Pancreatic Lesions on Biopsy |
| 8:30- 9 am | Session 2 - Pancreatitis-associated pancreatic cancer Moderator: Rajat Garg, UT Health San Antonio Speaker: Hari Sayana, UT Health San Antonio |
| 9- 9:30 am | Session 3 - Genetic predisposition syndromes for pancreatic malignancies Moderator: Mio Kitano, UT Health San Antonio Speaker: Jessica Jones, UT Health San Antonio |
| 9:30- 10 am | Session 4 - Robotic surgery for pancreatic cancer Moderator: Steven Abbate, Start Center for Cancer Care Possibilities and Limitations of Robotic Surgery for Pancreatic Cancer Speaker: Jin He, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine |
| 10 -10:15 am | Break |
| 10:15 - 10:45 am | Session 5 - Metastatic pancreatic adenocarcinoma Moderator: Sukeshi Arora Metastatic Pancreatic Cancer: Standard Care and Evolving Cancer |
| 10:45- 11:15 am | Session 6 - Novel Targets for pancreatic adenocarcinoma (non-RAS) Moderator: Kyaw Aung, UT Health Austin Cracking the Code of Advanced Pancreatic Cancer: Emerging Therapeutics and Hope Ahead Speaker: Devalingam Mahalingam, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University |
| 11:15 - 11:35 am | Session 7 - Drug development for RAS Inhibition for pancreatic adenocarcinoma Moderator: Daruka Mahadevan, UT Health San Antonio Early Phase Drug Development of RAS Inhibitors in Pancreatic Cancer: A Journey of Epistemic Humility |
| 11:35 am | Lunch |
| 12 - 1 pm | Panel Lunch Discussion: Management of toxicity of RAS Inhibitors in Pancreatic Cancer Moderator: Daruka Mahadevan, UT Health San Antonio Panel: Kyaw Aung, Amita Patnaik, Christos Fountzilas, Devalingam Mahalingam |
| 1 pm | Adjourn |
San Antonio Liver Cancer Symposium
7979 Wurzbach Road | San Antonio, TX 78229 US
Telephone: +1 210-450-1550
Email: UTHealthMTG@uthscsa.edu