Omar Alhalabi, MD
Department of Genitourinary Medical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine
Present Title & Affiliation
Primary Appointment
Assistant Professor, Department of Genitourinary Medical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX
Education & Training
Degree-Granting Education
| 2013 | Damascus University Faculty of Medicine, Damascus, SYR, MD, Doctor of Medicine |
Postgraduate Training
| 2017-2020 | Clinical Fellowship, Hematology/Oncology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer, Houston, TX |
| 2014-2017 | Clinical Residency, Internal Medicine Residency, Beaumont Health, Royal Oak, MI |
| 2013-2014 | Research Fellowship, Postdoctoral Research Fellowship, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH |
Board Certifications
| 2020 | American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM), Oncology |
| 2020 | American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM), Hematology |
| 2017 | American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM), Internal Medicine |
Experience & Service
Institutional Committee Activities
Committee Member, MD Anderson Cancer Center Renal Cell Carcinoma Research and Protocol Committee, 2020 - Present
Committee Member, MD Anderson Cancer Center Urothelial Carcinoma Research and Protocol Committee, 2020 - Present
Committee Member, MD Anderson Cancer Center Hematology/Oncology Fellowship Education Committee, 2019 - 2020
Committee Member, MD Anderson Cancer Center Hematology/Oncology Fellowship Wellness Committee, 2018 - 2020
Committee Member, MD Anderson Cancer Center GME Diversity Committee, 2017 - 2020
Council Representative, Beaumont Health Resident and Fellow Council, 2014 - 2017
Honors & Awards
| 2022 | American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Conquer Cancer Foundation - Career Development Award, for research proposal "Targeting the Folate and Adenosine Pathways to Enhance Ant0Cancer Immunity in MTAP-Deficient Urothelial Cancer", American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) |
| 2020 | Hematology/Medical Oncology Fellowship Humanitas Award – Recognition for dignity and compassionate patient care |
| 2020 | Waun Ki Hong Award for Achievement in Clinical Investigation |
| 2020 | The Thomas H. and Mayme P. Scott Fellowship in Cancer Research – Recognition of Research Excellence Award |
| 2020 | 6th Annual Immuno-Oncology Young Investigators’ Forum (IOYIF) – oral presentation |
| 2020 | AACR Molecular Biology in Clinical Oncology (MBCO) Virtual Workshop |
| 2020 | ASCO/AACR Methods in Clinical Cancer Research (MCCR) Virtual Workshop |
| 2019 | Top award recipients of the 2019 Texas Society of Clinical Oncology (TxSCO) Fellows Abstract Competition |
| 2019 | American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Conquer Cancer Foundation - Young Investigator Award for research proposal, “Investigation of combination therapy with pemetrexed, A2BR inhibitor, and anti-PD-L1 in MTAP deficient bladder cancer.” |
| 2017 | Gold Humanism Honor Society (GHHS) - Humanism and Excellence in Teaching Award (HETA) |
| 2016 | 2nd place clinical vignette oral presentation, American College of Physicians, Michigan chapter |
| 2016 | Medical ICU resident of the month, Beaumont Health |
| 2015 | Nightfloat Intern of the month, Beaumont Health |
| 2015 | 3rd place basic science research oral presentation, American College of Physicians, Michigan chapter |
| 2013 | Top ten graduates, Damascus University, Faculty of Medicine |
| 2006 | Baccalauréat très honorable avec félicitations du jury (Baccalaureate degree with honors, 2nd rank in the country), Ministry of Education, Syria |
Selected Publications
Peer-Reviewed Articles
- Alhalabi O, Thouvenin J, Négrier S, Vano YA, Campedel L, Hasanov E, Bakouny Z, Hahn AW, Bilen MA, Msaouel P, Choueiri TK, Viswanathan SR, Sircar K, Albiges L, Malouf GG, Tannir NM. Immune Checkpoint Therapy Combinations in Adult Advanced MiT Family Translocation Renal Cell Carcinomas. Oncologist 28(5):433-439, 2023. e-Pub 2023. PMID: 36640141.
- Tan WS, Tan MY, Alhalabi O, Campbell MT, Kamat AM, Gao J. Evolving systemic management of urothelial cancers. Curr Opin Oncol 35(3):186-199, 2023. e-Pub 2023. PMID: 36966497.
- Leo J, Dondossola E, Basham KJ, Wilson NR, Alhalabi O, Gao J, Kurnit KC, White MG, McQuade JL, Westin SN, Wellberg EA, Frigo DE. Stranger Things: New Roles and Opportunities for Androgen Receptor in Oncology Beyond Prostate Cancer. Endocrinology. e-Pub 2023. PMID: 37154098.
- Thouvenin J, Alhalabi O, Carlo M, Carril-Ajuria L, Hirsch L, Martinez-Chanza N, Négrier S, Campedel L, Martini D, Borchiellini D, Chahoud J, Lodi M, Barthélémy P, Hasanov E, Hahn AW, Gil T, Viswanathan SR, Bakouny Z, Msaouel P, Asim Bilen M, Choueiri TK, Albiges L, Tannir NM, Malouf GG. Efficacy of Cabozantinib in Metastatic MiT Family Translocation Renal Cell Carcinomas. Oncologist 27(12):1041-1047, 2022. PMID: 35979929.
- Saji A, Chopra M, Jacob J, Altan M, Alhalabi O, Shah AY, Qiao W, Wang Y, Thomas A. Implementing an immunotherapy toxicity (IOTOX) GI service improves outcomes in patients with immune-mediated diarrhea and colitis. J Cancer Res Clin Oncol:1-12. e-Pub 2022. PMID: 36585982.
- Mathew A, Shatila M, Lai Z, Tan D, Oliva ICG, Wang J, Alhalabi O, Zhang HC, Thomas A, Wang Y. Characteristics of appendicitis after immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy among cancer patients. J Cancer Res Clin Oncol. e-Pub 2022. PMID: 36163559.
- Liu C, Amin R, Shatila M, Short N, Altan M, Shah A, Alhalabi O, Okhuysen P, Thomas AS, Wang Y. Clinical characteristics and outcomes of tyrosine kinase inhibitor-related lower GI adverse effects. J Cancer Res Clin Oncol. e-Pub 2022. PMID: 36030431.
- Alhalabi O, Chen J, Zhang Y, Lu Y, Wang Q, Ramachandran S, Tidwell RS, Han G, Yan X, Meng J, Wang R, Hoang AG, Wang WL, Song J, Lopez L, Andreev-Drakhlin A, Siefker-Radtke A, Zhang X, Benedict WF, Shah AY, Wang J, Msaouel P, Zhang M, Guo CC, Czerniak B, Behrens C, Soto L, Papadimitrakopoulou V, Lewis J, Rinsurongkawong W, Rinsurongkawong V, Lee J, Roth J, Swisher S, Wistuba I, Heymach J, Wang J, Campbell MT, Efstathiou E, Titus M, Logothetis CJ, Ho TH, Zhang J, Wang L, Gao J. MTAP deficiency creates an exploitable target for antifolate therapy in 9p21-loss cancers. Nat Commun Paper #NCOMMS-20-37775B(1):1797, 2022. e-Pub 2022. PMID: 35379845.
- Alhalabi O, Hahn AW, Msaouel P, Meric-Bernstam F, Wilson N, Naing A, Piha-Paul S, Janku F, Pant S, Yap TA, Hong DS, Fu S, Karp D, Beltran K, Campbell E, Le H, Campbell MT, Shah A, Tannir NM, Siefker-Radtke A, Gao J, Roszik J, Subbiah V. Validation of Prognostic Scores in Patients with Metastatic Urothelial Cancer Enrolling in Phase I Targeted Therapy or Next Generation Immunotherapy Trials. Clin Genitourin Cancer 20(1):e16-e24, 2022. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 34362693.
- Alhalabi O, Altameemi L, Campbell MT, Meric-Bernstam F. Recent Advances in the Development of Antibody-Drug Conjugates in Urothelial Cancer. Cancer J 28(6):417-422, 2022. PMID: 36383903.
- Hensley PJ, Bree KK, Campbell MT, Alhalabi O, Kokorovic A, Miest T, Nogueras-Gonzalez GM, Gao J, Siefker-Radtke AO, Guo CC, Navai N, Dinney CP, Kamat AM. Progression of Disease after BCG Therapy: Refining Patient Selection for Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy before Radical Cystectomy. J Urol 206(5):101097JU0000000000001943, 2021. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 34184926.
- Hensley PJ, Bree KK, Campbell MT, Alhalabi O, Kokorovic A, Miest T, Nogueras-Gonzalez GM, Gao J, Siefker-Radtke AO, Guo CC, Navai N, Dinney CP, Kamat AM. Reply by Authors. J Urol 206(5):101097JU000000000000194302, 2021. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 34372685.
- Alhalabi O, Zhu Y, Hamza A, Qiao W, Lin Y, Wang RM, Shah AY, Campbell MT, Holla V, Kamat A, Wang WL, Wang J, Chen J, Meng J, Zhang M, Bondaruk J, Titus M, Genovese G, Czerniak BA, Shaw KR, Meric-Bernstam F, Guo CC, Logothetis CJ, Siefker-Radtke A, Msaouel P, Wang L, Liu J, Gao J. Integrative Clinical and Genomic Characterization of MTAP-deficient Metastatic Urothelial Cancer. Eur Urol Oncol. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 34789422.
- Han G, Yang G, Hao D, Lu Y, Thein K, Simpson BS, Chen J, Sun R, Alhalabi O, Wang R, Dang M, Dai E, Zhang S, Nie F, Zhao S, Guo C, Hamza A, Czerniak B, Cheng C, Siefker-Radtke A, Bhat K, Futreal A, Peng G, Wargo J, Peng W, Kadara H, Ajani J, Swanton C, Litchfield K, Ahnert JR, Gao J, Wang L. 9p21 loss confers a cold tumor immune microenvironment and primary resistance to immune checkpoint therapy. Nat Commun 12(1):5606, 2021. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 34556668.
- Benkhadra R, Nayfeh T, Patibandla SK, Peterson C, Prokop L, Alhalabi O, Murad MH, Mao SS. Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Cisplatin Based Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy in Muscle Invasive Bladder Cancer. Bladder Cancer, 2021.
- Elmehrath AO, Afifi AM, Al-Husseini MJ, Saad AM, Wilson N, Shohdy KS, Pilie P, Sonbol MB, Alhalabi O (Corresponding author). Causes of Death Among Patients With Metastatic Prostate Cancer in the US From 2000 to 2016. JAMA Netw Open 4(8):e2119568, 2021. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 34351403.
- Thouvenin J, Martínez Chanzá N, Alhalabi O, Lang H, Tannir NM, Barthélémy P, Malouf GG. Efficacy of Immune Checkpoint Inhibitors in Upper Tract Urothelial Carcinomas: Current Knowledge and Future Directions. Cancers (Basel) 13(17), 2021. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 34503152.
- Alhalabi O, Hasanov E, Wilson NR, Araujo J, Wang J, Campbell MT, Goswami S, Shah AY, Gao J, Msaouel P, Tannir NM. Outcomes of patients with intermediate-risk or poor-risk metastatic renal cell carcinoma who received their first cycle of nivolumab and ipilimumab in the hospital because of symptomatic disease: The MD Anderson Cancer Center experience. Int J Cancer 149(2):387-393, 2021. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 33739450.
- Alhalabi O, Msaouel P. Truncating CDKN1A mutations: an insight into the biology of urinary tract carcinomas?. Am J Cancer Res 11(12):6214-6217, 2021. e-Pub 2021. PMID: 35018253.
- Ravindranathan D, Alhalabi O, Rafei H, Shah AY, Bilen MA. Landscape of Immunotherapy in Genitourinary Malignancies. Adv Exp Med Biol 1342:143-192, 2021. PMID: 34972965.
- Alhalabi O, Subbiah V. Managing Cancer Care during the COVID-19 Pandemic and Beyond. Trends Cancer 6(7):533-535, 2020. e-Pub 2020. PMID: 32386875.
- Alhalabi O, Iyer S, Subbiah V. Testing for COVID-19 in patients with cancer. EClinicalMedicine 23:100374, 2020. e-Pub 2020. PMID: 32368727.
- Alhalabi O, Campbell M, Shah A, Siefker-Radtke A, Gao J. Emerging treatments in advanced urothelial cancer. Curr Opin Oncol 32(3):232-239, 2020. PMID: 32209822.
- Albittar AA, Alhalabi O, Glitza Oliva IC. Immunotherapy for Melanoma. Adv Exp Med Biol 1244:51-68, 2020. PMID: 32301010.
- Alhalabi O, Rafei H, Bilen MA, Shah AY. Current Landscape of Immunotherapy in Genitourinary Malignancies. Adv Exp Med Biol 1244:107-147, 2020. PMID: 32301013.
- Alhalabi O, Karam JA, Tannir NM. Evolving role of cytoreductive nephrectomy in metastatic renal cell carcinoma of variant histology. Curr Opin Urol 29(5):521-525, 2019. PMID: 31305271.
- Alhalabi O, Rafei H, Shah A, Siefker-Radtke A, Campbell M, Gao J. Targeting advanced urothelial carcinoma-developing strategies. Curr Opin Oncol 31(3):207-215, 2019. PMID: 30844889.
- Alhalabi O, Shah AY, Lemke EA, Gao J. Current and Future Landscape of Immune Checkpoint Inhibitors in Urothelial Cancer. Oncology (Williston Park) 33(1):11-8, 2019. PMID: 30731013.
- Parkes A, Warneke CL, Clifton K, Al-Awadhi A, Oke O, Pestana RC, Alhalabi O, Litton JK, Hortobagyi GN. Prognostic Factors in Patients with Metastatic Breast Cancer with Bone-Only Metastases. Oncologist 23(11):1282-1288, 2018. e-Pub 2018. PMID: 30120166.
- Yadav S, Ladkany R, Yadav D, Alhalabi O, Khaddam S, Isaac D, Cardenas PY, Zakalik D. Impact of BRCA Mutation Status on Survival of Women With Triple-negative Breast Cancer. Clin Breast Cancer 18(5):e1229-e1235, 2018. e-Pub 2017. PMID: 29402697.
- Wei C, Wei C, Alhalabi O, Chen L. T-cell/histiocyte-rich large B-cell lymphoma in a child: A case report and review of literature. World J Clin Cases 6(6):121-126, 2018. PMID: 29988902.
- Stavrou EX, Fang C, Bane KL, Long AT, Naudin C, Kucukal E, Gandhi A, Brett-Morris A, Mumaw MM, Izadmehr S, Merkulova A, Reynolds CC, Alhalabi O, Nayak L, Yu WM, Qu CK, Meyerson HJ, Dubyak GR, Gurkan UA, Nieman MT, Sen Gupta A, Renné T, Schmaier AH. Factor XII and uPAR upregulate neutrophil functions to influence wound healing. J Clin Invest 128(3):944-959, 2018. e-Pub 2018. PMID: 29376892.
- Gjeorgjievski M, Alhalabi O, Kazanji N, Desai T. Clostridium septicum arthritis and aortitis in a patient with underlying colon cancer. QJM 109(7):481-2, 2016. e-Pub 2016. PMID: 26803153.
- Tagami T, Alhalabi O, Ward N, Huang J. Paraneoplastic Dermatosis in a Patient with Anaplastic Large-Cell Lymphoma: Case Report and Literature Review. Dermatopathology (Basel) 3(2):39-43, 2016. e-Pub 2016. PMID: 27504444.
- Gittleman HR*, Merkulova A*, Alhalabi O*, Stavrou EX, Veigl ML, Barnholtz-Sloan JS, Schmaier AH. A Cross-sectional Study of KLKB1 and PRCP Polymorphisms in Patient Samples with Cardiovascular Disease. Front Med (Lausanne) 3:17, 2016. e-Pub 2016. PMID: 27200353.
- Stavrou EX, Fang C, Merkulova A, Alhalabi O, Grobe N, Antoniak S, Mackman N, Schmaier AH. Reduced thrombosis in Klkb1-/- mice is mediated by increased Mas receptor, prostacyclin, Sirt1, and KLF4 and decreased tissue factor. Blood 125(4):710-9, 2015. e-Pub 2014. PMID: 25339356.
Abstracts
- Wang J, Campbell MT, Shah AY, Goswami S, Masaouel P, Alhalabi O, Hahn AW, Kovitz CA, Jana BR, Araujo JC. A phase II study of nivolumab with ipilimumab and cabozantinib in patients with untreated renal cell carcinoma brain metastases. American Society of Clinical Oncology, 2023.
- Koshkin VS, Henderson N, Kilari D, Jindal T, Alhalabi O, Freeman Dm Basu A, Barata PC, Bilen MA, Zakharia Y. Enfortumab vedotin (EV) outcomes with and without immediate prior immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) in patients (tpts) with advanced urothelial carcinoma (aUC). American Society of Clinical Oncology, 2023.
- Jindal T, Kilari D, Alhalabi O, Nizam A, Khaki AR, Basu A, Barata PC, Bilen M, Shah S, Zakharia Y. Biomarkers of response to enfortumab vedotin (EV) in patients (pts) with advanced urothelial carcinoma (aUC): Analysis of the UNITE study. American Society of Clinical Oncology, 2023.
- Shah AY, Campbell MT, Tidwell R, Siefker-Radtke AO, Goswami S, Alhalabi O, Adriazola A, Shaw L, Ye Y, Chen J, Yan X, Wang L, Gao J. A phase II trial evaluating combination pemetrexed and avelumab in patients with MTAP-deficient advanced urothelial cancer. Journal of Clinical Oncology 40(16_suppl):TPS4612-TPS4612, 2022.
- Alhalabi O, Tannir N, Momin H, Yilmaz B, Stephen B, Ejezie C, Moyers J, Gurses S, How J, Fu S, Ahnert J, Hong D, Piha-Paul S, Subbiah V, Dumbrava E, Karp D, Janku F, Meric-Bernstam F, Naing A. Phase Ib trial of selinexor (SEL) in combination with nivolumab (NIVO) alone or nivolumab plus ipilimumab (NIVO+IPI) in patients (pts) with advanced malignancies: The renal cell carcinoma (RCC) experience. Journal of Clinical Oncology 40(16_suppl):4551, 2022.
- McKean M, Aggen D, Lakhani N, Bashir B, Luke J, Hoffman-Censits J, Alhalabi O, Bowman I, Guancial E, Tan A, Lingaraj T, Timothy M, Kacena K, Malek K, Santillana S. Phase 1a/b open-label study of IK-175, an oral AHR inhibitor, alone and in combination with nivolumab in patients with locally advanced or metastatic solid tumors and urothelial carcinoma. Journal of Clinical Oncology 40(16_suppl):TPS3169, 2022.
- Hahn AW, Viscuse P, Surasi D, Bathala T, Wiele A, Starbuck M, Campbell MT, Yogesh Shah A, Jonasch E, Gao JJ, Alhalabi O, Sircar K, Tannir N, Msaouel P. Treatment outcomes in patients (pts) with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC) with sarcomatoid and/or rhabdoid (S/R) features after progressive disease (PD) on immune checkpoint therapy (ICT): The MD Anderson Cancer Center experience. Journal of Clinical Oncology DOI: 10.1200/JCO.2022.40.6_suppl.351 Journal of Clinical Oncology 40, no. 6_suppl (February 20, 2022) 351-351, 2022.
- Saji A, Chopra M, Jacob J, Altan M, Alhalabi O, Shah AY, Qiao W, Wang Y, Thomas A. Implementing an Immunotherapy Toxicity (IOTOX) GI Service Improves Outcomes in Patients with Immune Mediated Diarrhea and Colitis. DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-2216829/v, 2022.
- 12. Reddy, N. K., Roszik, J., Norris, D. C., Groisberg, R., Coleman, N., Alhalabi, O., Subbiah, V.. Dosing, drug reduction, drug interruption, and drug discontinuation rates among U.S. FDA approved tyrosine kinase inhibitors. Journal of Clinical Oncology, 39(15_suppl), 3112-3112. doi:10.1200/JCO.2021.39.15_suppl.3112, 2021.
- Wilson N, Alhalabi O, Hasanov E, et al. 241 Immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) in brain metastases (BM) from advanced small cell urothelial cancer (aSCUC). Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer 2021;9:doi: 10.1136/jitc-2021-SITC2021.241, 2021.
- Alhalabi O, Hasanov E, Araujo J, Wang J, Campbell MT, Goswami S, Shah AY, Gao J, Msaouel P, Tannir N. 441 Outcomes of patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma with intermediate- or poor-risk symptomatic disease who received their first cycle of nivolumab and ipilimumab while being hospitalized. Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer (JITC), 2020.
- Alhalabi, O., et al.. Outcomes and the impact of genomic characteristics on patients with metastatic urothelial carcinoma enrolled in early phase trials. Journal of Clinical Oncology 38, 5029-5029, 2020.
- Hahn, A.W., Alhalabi, O. et al.. Phase I clinical trials as a therapeutic option for patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC). Journal of Clinical Oncology 38, 5073-5073, 2020.
- Alhalabi, O., et al.. 779P Validation of prognostic scores in patients with metastatic bladder carcinoma (mBC) enrolled in early phase clinical trials. Annals of Oncology 31:S597-S598, 2020.
- Soomro, Z. A., Alhalabi, O et al.. Systemic therapy for patients with breast cancer and one to three brain metastases (BM). Journal of Clinical Oncology 38((15_suppl)):1090-1090, 2020.
- Alhalabi O, Chen J, Campbell MT, Slack Tidwell R, Han G, Wang W-L, et al.. Correlation of methylthioadenosine phosphorylase (MTAP) loss with response to anti-folate therapy in urothelial bladder carcinoma (UBC). Journal of Clinical Oncology. 2019;37(15_suppl):4521-, 2019.
- Alhalabi O, Campbell MT, Slack-Tidwell R, Siefker-Radtke AO, Shah AY, Efstathiou E, et al.. A phase II trial to evaluate pemetrexed clinical responses in relation to tumor methylthioadenosine phosphorylase (MTAP) gene status in patients with previously treated metastatic urothelial carcinoma. Journal of Clinical Oncology. 2019;37(7_suppl):385-, 2019.
- Alhalabi O, Yadav S, Jaiyesimi IA.. Prescribing patterns of rasburicase and glucose-6-phosphate-dehydrogenase (G6PD) testing in a large community health system. Journal of Clinical Oncology. 2016;34(15_suppl):e18206-e, 2016.
Book Chapters
- Alhalabi O, Rafei H, Bilen MA, Shah AY. In: Current Landscape of Immunotherapy in Genitourinary Malignancies. Immunotherapy 3rd edition, 2020.
- Alhalabi O, Gao J. In: Medical treatment with targeted therapy. Urinary Bladder Pathology 1st edition, 2020.
- Albittar A, Alhalabi O, Glitza I. In: Immunotherapy in Melanoma. Immunotherapy 3rd edition, 2020.
Grant & Contract Support
| Title: | Investigation of combination therapy with pemetrexed, A2BR inhibitor, and anti-PD-L1 in MTAP deficient bladder cancer |
| Funding Source: | Conquer Cancer Foundation of ASCO/Bristol-Myers Squibb |
| Role: | Principal Investigator |