The physicist-turned-cancer researcher has FDA backing, lab results, and one major obstacle left
Dr. Hadiyah-Nicole Green is one of the first African American women to earn a PhD in physics, and she has spent the last two decades building a cancer treatment the scientific and medical communities are beginning to take seriously. She holds three degrees in physics from Alabama A&M University and earned her master’s and doctorate from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. She is currently an assistant professor at Morehouse School of Medicine and the founder of the Ora Lee Smith Cancer Research Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to making her treatment affordable and accessible for all. The technology she developed uses lasers and nanotechnology to eliminate solid tumors in lab mice in just 15 days after a single 10-minute treatment, with no observable side effects. Human clinical trials are within reach. Funding is the only thing standing in the way.
Dr. Green, founder of the Ora Lee Smith Cancer Research Foundation, sat down with Rolling Out Health IQ to break down the science, the mission, and what the public can do to help.
Who is Dr. Hadiyah Nicole Green and what are you working to change?
I like to look at myself as a God-fearing woman on a mission to make the world a better place. By academic training, I am a physicist. For my bachelor’s in physics, I graduated with a 4.0 GPA after interning at NASA, calibrating lasers for the International Space Station, and at the University of Rochester Institute of Optics.
My aunt and uncle, who raised me, both had horrible bouts with cancer that inspired me to pivot and dedicate my life to developing a better, faster, more patient-friendly way to eradicate cancer. I started the Ora Lee Smith Cancer Research Foundation to raise the funding we need to take this cancer treatment into human clinical trials and ensure it will be affordable and accessible for all.
Walk us through your cancer treatment in simple terms. What does it do and how does it work?
The treatment I developed uses tiny specks that get excited by a laser, and it causes the cells to heat up so hot, they die. By themselves, each component is harmless. But together, something happens inside those nanoparticles. It is physical, not chemical, and it causes the heat that kills the cancer cells.
Most side effects with current cancer treatments happen because the treatment is injected into the entire body. My treatment is injected directly at the site of the tumor. The difference is like having an atom bomb to kill everything versus taking a bullet like an assassin and just taking out one person. My treatment is the bullet. Chemotherapy and radiation is the atom bomb.
What does this mean for the future of cancer treatment?
The vision is for this technology to be new arsenal in the war on cancer. Not to replace what currently works, but there are still nearly 10 million people a year who die from cancer worldwide despite the best care available. The vision is for this to be an outpatient procedure that can go anywhere in the world, even on a medical mobile, in developing countries, in underserved communities. The bigger mission of my cancer charity is to ensure that this treatment is affordable and accessible for all.
You recently received an FDA Breakthrough Device Designation. What is that and why is it such a big deal?
The FDA sometimes cherry-picks the most promising developments and says these are so promising, we want to help fast track them through FDA approval. Most of the entities approaching the FDA are huge pharmaceutical companies with billions of dollars, not small organizations like my nonprofit. The FDA is saying they are going to work with us, cut some of the red tape, and move roadblocks out of the way so that we can have a fast track into approval for human trials and beyond.
Without that designation, it would take so much longer and so much more money. It would almost be virtually impossible for a small organization like ours to get through this massive regulatory process. Now we are being ushered into human clinical trials. The unfortunate part is that I have done all the paperwork I can do to begin human trials, and I do not have the funding to conduct them yet.
Why was it important that this treatment be made affordable and accessible to everyone?
When I started on this journey, my aunt said she would rather die than experience the side effects of chemotherapy and radiation. I was her primary caregiver the last three months of her life. I watched her go from being our matriarch, the one who cooked Christmas and Thanksgiving dinner, to someone who could not walk, and then could not talk. Three months later my uncle was diagnosed and opted for chemo and radiation. I saw him lose 150 pounds, all of his hair, his fingernails turned black, his skin looked like it had been barbecued, and he had uncontrollable diarrhea for months.
Being both of their primary caregivers, it fell on my heart that there has to be something better than this. For me it was never about getting rich. It was about reducing the suffering of those impacted by cancer. Reduce the suffering from the treatment, reduce the financial suffering, reduce the mental and emotional suffering from those going through cancer and their caregivers. I am in a unique position not to sell out, and I need people who believe in the vision of affordable and accessible healthcare for all.
You received a $1.1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. How does that move the needle toward human clinical trials?
That funding from 2016 was a career development award. When I got more data, I used that to spin off and apply for a second grant I did not tell anybody about. You may be the first person I am sharing this with. I received a second grant from the Department of Veterans Affairs for $1.2 million. That one gives me infrastructure to house my first in-human trials at a VA facility and a few years of salary.
In 10 years of having my cancer charity, I have never taken a salary from donations. I fund operating costs by donating money from my day job salary and speaking engagement honorariums. But it is 1 million here, 1 million there in a $100 million project. Now we are roughly 4 million short of where we need to be to start human trials.
Which cancers are you focused on first and why?
The technology is designed to target and treat a variety of solid local tumors including breast, prostate, head and neck, colorectal, skin, and brain. My consultant recommended, the FDA also recommended, and the last VA grant review panel recommended, that I start with skin cancer. So I am planning to start with skin cancer, then move into head and neck cancer.
What would it mean to you personally to see this treatment reach patients?
It has been 23 years since my aunt lost her battle to cancer. I cannot invent a time machine to go back and save her. I have been endeavoring for 23 years to put this treatment into human trials so that other people do not have to lose their loved ones the way I lost mine.
This is an opportunity to reduce human suffering. This is an opportunity to give people a chance to live, not just a few extra months, but to live with a high quality of life. As a get-it-done type of woman, it is humbling to say I need this kind of help. I have basically put the rest of my life on hold so that I can try to help save other people.
Black communities are disproportionately affected by cancer. How does your work speak directly to that reality?
My aunt did not get diagnosed until it was late stage. Most people in our community do not get diagnosed with cancer until it is late, or too late. It is because we do not go to the doctor, we do not trust the medical system, and we do not get the healthcare we need early on.
Nobody should have to make a choice where they would rather die than get treated for a curable disease. Our community comes with baggage starting from before the Tuskegee Experiment and Henrietta Lacks. Our mistrust of the medical community is valid and warranted. And meanwhile, you have scientists like me from our community who come with our best interests in mind. This is also why it is important for me to stay independent.
What do you need from the public right now?
What I need from the public right now is donations and volunteers. Everyone can go to OraLee.org/getinvolved to see opportunities to volunteer, donate, fundraise, and partner with us.
Even if you can copy and paste, help organize files, respond to emails, or make calls, it is a virtual volunteer opportunity. And if it is a dollar, $5, or $10 a month, go to OraLee.org and chip in. The technology is collecting dust in the lab while I am trying to fundraise, and fundraising should not be the thing that slows down a cancer treatment from saving lives.
To learn more and support Dr. Green’s work, visit OraLee.org and follow her on social media at @DrHadiyahGreen and @WeAreOraLee.