A woman with long brown hair, smiling, and wearing a blue dress

Alison Laws

MD, MPH, FRCSC
Pronouns: she/her/hers

Positions

Assistant Professor

Cumming School of Medicine, Department of Surgery | General Surgery

Assistant Professor

Cumming School of Medicine, Department of Oncology

Member

Arnie Charbonneau Cancer Institute

Contact information

Email

alison.laws@ucalgary.ca

Web presence

SPHERE

Preferred method of communication

Admin Assistant

Victoria Pelletier
Email: victoria.pelletier@albertahealthservices.ca
Office: 403.944.1224

Background

Credentials

Fellow, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, 2019

Educational Background

BSc Life Sciences and Physics, University of British Columbia, 2011

MD, McMaster University, 2014

MPH Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, 2022

Biography

Dr. Laws completed her General Surgery Residency Training at the University of Calgary and Breast Surgical Oncology Fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital/Brigham and Women's Hospital/Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, MA. She works as a Breast Surgical Oncologist and General Surgeon at the Foothills Medical Centre. She is an active clinical researcher with interests in improving cancer outcomes for breast cancer patients and optimizing models of care delivery. 

 

Research

Areas of Research

Area of Focus
  • Optimizing surgical care for breast cancer patients
Summary of Research

Dr. Laws’ research program investigates treatment strategies for breast cancer that optimize oncologic outcomes while minimizing morbidity. Current efforts are focused on a prospective cohort study that will evaluate tailored axillary surgery for node-positive disease, a novel surgical technique that is hypothesized to reduce the likelihood of arm pain, stiffness and swelling after surgery. 

She is also interested in developing care delivery models that facilitate implementation of evidence-based treatment. In this area, she is presently leading a study evaluating a clinical care pathway for breast cancer patients requiring neoadjuvant chemotherapy, funded by the Canadian Association of General Surgeons Operating Grant. 

During her previous employment at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital & Dana Farber Cancer Institute from 2020-2023, Dr. Laws led numerous studies using a large institutional cohort of patients at high-risk for breast cancer, with a particular focus on those with atypical breast lesions. Her work included demonstrating the safety of omitting routine surgical excision for lobular neoplasia, the limited utility of screening MRI in patients with atypia and the effect of a new low-dose tamoxifen regimen on chemoprevention uptake and adherence. She has ongoing collaborations with BWH/DFCI, currently focused on the clinical implementation of novel breast cancer risk assessment tools including polygenic risk scores and AI-based algorithms applied to mammograms. 

Publications

PubMed

More Information

Selected publications:

  1. Laws A, Lagendijk M, Grossmith S, Hughes M, Lin NU, Mittendorf EA, Eliassen AH, King TA, Dominici LS. Long-Term Patient-Reported Arm Symptoms in Breast Cancer Survivors. Ann Surg Oncol. 2024 Mar;31(3):1623-33.
  2. Laws A, Leonard S, Hershey E, Stokes S, Vincuilla J, Sharma E, Milliron K, Garber JE, Merajver SD, King TA, Pilewskie ML. Upgrade rates and breast cancer development among germline pathogenic variant carriers with high-risk breast lesions. Ann Surg Oncol. 2024 Jan 23. Online ahead of print. 
  3. Laws A, Punglia RS. Endocrine Therapy for Primary and Secondary Prevention After Diagnosis of High-Risk Breast Lesions or Preinvasive Breast Cancer. J Clin Oncol. 2023 Jun;41(17):3092-9. 
  4. Laws A, Kantor O, King TA. Surgical Management of the Axilla for Breast Cancer. Hematol Oncol Clin North Am. 2023 Feb;37(1):51-77. 
  5. Laws A, Katlin F, Hans M, Graichen M, Kantor O, Minami C, Bychkovsky BL, Pace LE, Scheib R, Garber JE, King TA. Screening MRI Does Not Increase Cancer Detection or Result in an Earlier Stage at Diagnosis for Patients with High-Risk Breast Lesions: A Propensity Score Analysis. Ann Surg Oncol. 2023 Jan;30(1):68-77. 
  6. Laws A, Pastorello R, Dey T, Grossmith S, King C, McGrath M, Schnitt SJ, Mittendorf EA, King T. Impact of the Histologic Pattern of Residual Tumor After Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy on Recurrence and Survival in Stage I-III Breast Cancer. Ann Surg Oncol. 2022 Nov;29(12):7726-36. 
  7. Laws A, Katlin F, Nakhlis F, Chikarmane SA, Schnitt SJ, King TA. Atypical Lobular Hyperplasia and Classic Lobular Carcinoma In Situ Can Be Safely Managed Without Surgical Excision. Ann Surg Oncol. 2022 Mar;29(3):1660-7.
  8. Laws A, Mulvey TM. Implementation of a High-Risk Breast Clinic for comprehensive care of women with elevated breast cancer risk identified by risk assessment models in the community. JCO Oncol Pract. 2021 Feb;17(2):e217-25. 
  9. Laws A, Garrido-Castro A, Poorvu P, Winer E, Mittendorf E, King T. Utility of the 21-Gene Recurrence Score in Node-Positive Breast Cancer. Oncology (Williston Park). 2021 Feb 11;35(2):77-84. 
  10. Laws A, Dillon K, Kelly BN, Kantor O, Hughes KS, Gadd MA, Smith BL, Lamb LR, Specht M. Node-positive patients treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy can be spared axillary lymph node dissection with wireless non-radioactive localizers. Ann Surg Oncol. 2020 Nov;27(12):4819-27. 
  11. Laws A, Cheifetz R, Warburton R, McGahan C, Pao JS, Kuusk U, Dingee C, Quan ML, McKevitt E. Nodal staging affects adjuvant treatment choices in elderly patients with clinically node-negative, estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer. Curr Oncol. 2020 Oct;27(5):250-6. 
  12. Laws A, Mulvey TM, Jalbert N, Dalton S, Kantor O, Harris KA, Krag KJ, Walsh EP, Coopey SB. Baseline screening MRI uptake and findings in women with ≥20% lifetime risk of breast cancer. Ann Surg Oncol. 2020 Oct;27(10):3595-602. 
  13. Laws A, Kong K, Xu Y, Brisson AM, Bouchard-Fortier A, Quan ML. Breast biopsy during post-treatment surveillance of screen-detected breast cancer yields high rates of benign findings. Ann Surg Oncol. 2020 Aug;27(8):2689-97. 
  14. Laws A, Crocker A, Dort J, Olson D, Elwi A, Anderes S, Parker S, Estey A, Keehn A, Quan ML. Improving Wait Times and Patient Experience Through Implementation of a Provincial Expedited Diagnostic Pathway for BI-RADS 5 Breast Lesions. Ann Surg Oncol. 2019 Oct;26(10):3361-7.
  15. Laws A, Hughes ME, Hu J, Barry WT, Dominici L, Nakhlis F, Barbie T, Duggan M, Weiss A, Rhei E, Carter K, Nimbkar S, Schnitt SJ, King TA. Impact of Residual Nodal Disease Burden on Technical Outcomes of Sentinel Lymph Node Biopsy for Node-Positive (cN1) Breast Cancer Patients Treated with Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy. Ann Surg Oncol. 2019 Nov;26(12):3846-55. 
  16. Laws A, Brar MS, Bouchard-Fortier A, Leong B, Quan ML. Does intra-operative margin assessment improve margin status and re-excision rates? A population-based analysis of outcomes in breast-conserving surgery for ductal carcinoma in situ. J Surg Oncol. 2018 Dec;118(7):1205-11.
  17. Laws A, Anderson K, Hu J, McLean K, Novak L, Dominici LS, Nakhlis F, Carty M, Caterson S, Chun Y, Duggan M, Barry W, Connell N, Golshan M, King TA. Implementation of a Venous Thromboembolism Prophylaxis Protocol Using the Caprini Risk Assessment Model in Patients Undergoing Mastectomy. Ann Surg Oncol. 2018 Nov;25(12):3548-55. 
  18. Laws A, Brar MS, Bouchard-Fortier A, Leong B, Quan ML. Intraoperative Margin Assessment in Wire-Localized Breast-Conserving Surgery for Invasive Cancer: A Population-Level Comparison of Techniques. Ann Surg Oncol. 2016 Oct;23(10):3290-6.