Alexi Vasbinder

My program of research aims to improve the lives of cancer survivors by developing clinically relevant methods for risk stratification and devising multidisciplinary strategies to mitigate the adverse effects of cancer treatments, including cardiotoxic effects and symptom burden. My goals are to develop evidence-based management strategies to better inform clinical guidelines and improve access to cancer survivorship and cardio-oncology care services to all cancer survivors. I employ a precision health approach, with expertise in biological markers, large prospective cohort studies, advanced epidemiological methods, causal analysis, and machine learning.

My dissertation focused on identifying biomarker determinants of radiation-induced cardiovascular disease and fatigue in breast cancer survivors, receiving funding from the NIH (F31NR018588), American Cancer Society, American Nurses Foundation, and Oncology Nursing Foundation. I completed a postdoctoral fellowship in cardiovascular medicine (T32HL007853) to further my training in risk prediction modeling, developing the CARE-BMT risk score which is the first pre-bone marrow transplant risk score to predict the risk of cardiovascular complications after transplant. My work also led to the development of a biomarker screening strategy for immune-checkpoint inhibitor myocarditis. My current research focuses on better understanding the determinants of cardiovascular complications after cancer and developing exercise-based interventions to improve cardiorespiratory fitness in cancer survivors.

Please check out our research website for more information https://vasbinderlab.nursing.uw.edu/.