IO ‘Unmasked’: An Interview With Dr. Yolanda Bryce

In this new series from IO Learning, we sit down with a powerful thought leader in the IO field, Dr. Yolanda Bryce, to learn more about her past, present, and future as a physician and person. 

Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman doctor in modern times, once said, “It is not easy to be a pioneer – but oh, it is fascinating!” In the interventional oncology field, there are many pioneering women that strive daily to form a brighter future for patients and physicians alike in the cancer treatment field. 

However, one that continues to stand out as a thought leader and advocate for equity in IO is Dr. Yolanda Bryce, a radiologist with expertise in interventional radiology, oncology, and breast imaging at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. In the first feature in this new series highlighting the human side of interventional oncology, we sat down with Dr. Bryce to discuss her professional and personal life as well as her integral role in the IO field as a fearless and passionate physician. 
 

Samantha Hager:

So let's start with, how did you get into the healthcare industry, and at what age did you decide to pursue this profession?

Dr. Bryce:

Well, my dad is an internal medicine doctor. He takes care of adult patients, I guess, from a medical standpoint. I have two sisters. So there's three daughters, and he always wanted one of us to be in medicine. And I was, and am a daddy's girl and I was the only one willing to do it. And mostly, I went in it because of him, and I have not regretted that choice. So, it worked out.

Samantha Hager:

What are the accomplishments you've achieved in your field that you are most proud of?

Dr. Bryce:

I think what I'm most proud of is the fact that I have developed very unique niches that I don't think other people have. I have double training in both breast imaging and interventional radiology from two world-renowned institutions, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center for Breast Imaging and Miami Cardiac and Vascular Institute for Interventional Radiology Training. So my career has taken two very distinct niches, very dedicated fields. One is breast cancer, both primary and metastatic breast cancer. I pioneered the cryoablation for locoregional breast cancer at my institution. And I'm very much involved in trying to find better solutions for metastatic breast cancer to hopefully increase survival. That is the goal.

And then on the other aspect, I am very passionate and dedicated to patients with vascular disease, specifically peripheral arterial disease and chronic limb threatening ischemia. And because, even at a more unique level I work at a cancer center, my care is even more focused on vascular diseases in the cancer population. And because of the nature of the diseases that I care for, there is an over-representation of minorities in these disease states. 

So, another aspect that I guess I am happy about is that I get to focus and think about and hopefully improve disparities in both breast cancer, because they're also disproportionately affected by breast cancer and survival, but also in peripheral arterial disease and chronic limb threatening ischemia. So, I guess I am most proud, just because I feel like I'm a very uniquely trained and practicing physician. I don't know if anyone is like me.

Samantha Hager:

So you were a member of the Breast Disease Management Team at MSK. What does that entail and how does it impact women's health on a broader scale?

Dr. Bryce:

So, Sloan Kettering is a special place where everything is very, very, very narrowly focused. So, the breast DMT, or Disease Management Team, only deals with breast cancer. And actually, there's two different ones. There's one for local disease and one for metastatic disease. But regardless, the team is made up of radiologists, including interventional radiologists, medical oncologists, and surgery and radiation oncology. 

So it's the different multidisciplinary factors that go into taking care of the breast cancer patient. So, because we know that the treatment, especially with metastatic breast cancer, is a huge challenge, we work together to try to decide what is best for each patient individually. Hopefully that will develop better treatment algorithms to help improve survival in this population, which tends to be super challenging, especially in the area of triple negative breast cancer, where patients tend to be younger and their median survival is much less.

Samantha Hager:

Yeah. Now, you posted a video of you singing to your dog on social media.

Dr. Bryce:

Oh my goodness! [Laughs]

Samantha Hager:

Could you tell us a bit about your cute dog and other pets you may have?

Dr. Bryce:

Oh, my gosh. I have two beautiful dogs. I call them lab mixes, but they are actually, they have husky, pit, and lab. At least that's what we can tell from their parents, which are my parents' dogs who were two stray dogs and showed up at our house, neither was neutered or spayed, and they ended up having nine puppies, because my parents did not move fast enough on getting them fixed. So anyways, I got the two last ones of the litter. One is named Ernest Terrance, and the other one is Francis Walter. And they're wonderful dogs. They're very cute.

Samantha Hager:

So, you say in your bio on Memorial Sloan Kettering's website, "I am inspired every day by the patients I serve. They teach me more about strength, purpose, and love than I could ever hope to learn elsewhere." Can you describe a specific time that you were inspired by a patient and how that impacted your career and dedication to your craft?

Dr. Bryce:

I find that cancer patients are unlike any other population I've cared for. They are really on a mission to fight for survival, and they're taking you, as a physician, along the journey with them, and you are trying to extend all your facilities to help them succeed. But they're the ones that are living day-to-day. I have a patient, for example, that she's had breast cancer that is metastatic now, going on for 10 years. She's an advocate for herself. She goes and researches the different trials that are going on.

She convinced a surgeon to resect her breast cancer from her liver when it was just one site. Then, when there were multiple sites, she went to look for trials. She went to look for interventional oncology solutions with ablation and radioembolization. Even though some of the treatment's effects have had adverse outcomes for her, she continues to just be so resilient. And yet, she is a mother, she's a wife, and she continues to be there for her family. 

And it's not just this one case. There are many, many cases, and a lot of them are still trying to raise families. Some of them are still trying to go to school and maintain jobs. They're just fighters. And also, they have a gratitude that I don't know if other patients have. They just have gratitude to be here, and also the care that they're receiving, even when they're going through such trials.

Samantha Hager:

Absolutely. So, you take part in, like you said, a multitude of subspecialties. How do you find the time to balance all of this, and what do you do in your free time to avoid burnout in your personal life?

Dr. Bryce:

So, to be productive, I have four steps that I try to incorporate. I do the hardest thing first, I do one thing at a time, I set time blocks, and I limit distraction. So sometimes I purposely have to silence my phone, because I will be answering emails in the middle. And, I am naturally not an organized person, so I tend to make lists to keep me organized and everything that I need to do, any meeting or so forth, have to be on my calendar. And I have an amazing office manager named Alexa Lamore who keeps that organized for me. So what I have done to be productive and get a lot done is trying to have people help me who are good at organization, but also trying to maximize the time that I have by just doing the hardest thing first, setting up time blocks, decreasing distractions, and so forth.

Samantha Hager:

So how do you feel, knowing that your procedures often lead to families having more time with their loved ones?

Dr. Bryce:

It makes me feel like at least I had a tiny victory, and you want them to be able to spend quality time with their family, feeling as good as possible. I don't know if it's worthwhile having them spend time with their family when they're not feeling well, but if you can get them to a point to spend time with them and feel okay. So, sometimes, some of the procedures we do in interventional oncology and interventional radiology are less morbid than say, systemic chemotherapy. And so, that may buy them some time off chemotherapy or from switching to another chemotherapy drug that might cause more toxicity. So yes, some of our procedures in oncology do help patients live—I don't know if we can say for sure that these procedures make them live longer, I don't know if the data is there, but at least a lot of the time, it helps them to live more comfortably with family.

Samantha Hager:

You often discuss closing the gaps in racial disparities in cancer treatment as a whole. How does this endeavor fulfill your sense of purpose? And what are your hopes for the future of IO with this concept of equity in mind?

Dr. Bryce:

There is a huge disparity that has been recognized clinically in gaps regarding morbidity and mortality in minority patients. In my sphere of care, it's black and Hispanic patients. That has been recognized and the hospital has been moving forward to widen the insurances that we take in order to close that gap. What I'm interested in my career is closing the gap with regards to research and representation within research. There has been a little bit of movement since the NIH created two acts to improve representation in research.

But there is a lot to go, because clinical studies and data from these studies are what is driving patient care. But if the studies are being done only in a certain demographic, then those results are not generalizable. So my mission and my goal as a physician scientist is to improve representation in clinical research, which is one form of closing the gap. The more information that you're able to apply to the actual patients that you're trying to treat, will be able to give better insight into what is beneficial for the different treatment groups, not just a representation that might be just a small number of the kind of patients that are being treated.

Samantha Hager:

Now, I found out that your sister is a musician. Do you feel that you both share the same passion for your professions, or do you think the passion a physician has differs from that of a musician or artist?

Dr. Bryce:

So, I have to be very clear. So, my sister is an opera singer. My mother is also classically trained and owns a community arts center called Arts Unlimited Southwest. And my sister, who is a therapist, is now specializing in musical therapy. So, my family is very musically oriented, at least my two sisters and my mom. My dad and I, we're the ones that are the medicine people and not so musically inclined, but every single one of us are extremely passionate and successful in the careers we have chosen.

Samantha Hager:

So you and even your mother have stood up for civil rights in the past when injustices in our society have arisen. Do you feel that these injustices drive you to fight for equity in your industry even more so than you would otherwise?

Dr. Bryce:

Yes, I do think so. From when I was very young, I was very aware of the disparities around. And I think, going into medicine, I get to take that passion and dedication I've had and apply it to my field of, well, where I am an expert. There are so many disparities, and not just racial disparities. There's so many disparities and there's so many issues that need attention. But, I strongly feel that if everyone does their small part in whatever field where they were placed on this earth and where their focus of attention is, if everyone would just do their part in that little area, this place would be so much better. So I have taken my passion for equity and civil rights and so forth, and applied it to breast cancer and peripheral arterial disease within the cancer context.

Samantha Hager:

What are the top three bands or songs you listen to when working on projects in order to relax or stay motivated?

Dr. Bryce:

I can give you some genres. I don't know if I could say something specific. I listen to a lot of Christian contemporary music and a lot of '90s hip hop.

Samantha Hager:

If you could recommend one book that changed your life or altered your outlook on life, what would it be and why?

Dr. Bryce:

Yes. So first, my mother always encouraged us to read. So we were always reading as children. And growing up, the first book that I would say impacted me a lot was Souls of Black Folks, by W. E. B. Du Bois. And I read that when I was very small, 10 or 11. And I don't even know that I understood everything that was in the book, but that started out my course very, very early with regards to my place and my role in this world as a black person that happens to have privilege, because I have two parents that were educated and forced education upon us as children, and made us know that we are loved, and dedicated so much of their time.

So as a person that was placed in this world, having entered a very stable home and stable education experience, it is my job to help those that look like me, but were not given that kind of opportunity. So that would be the first one. 

The second book I read when I was more of a teenager, it's called Detained, by Ngugi wa Thiong'o, a Kenyan writer who basically talked about what his country had become after Neocolonialism. And that was also a very important eye-opening experience for me, to know my responsibilities within a society, to advance those less fortunate.

Samantha Hager:

So, who in the industry helped you to succeed throughout your career? And do you now do the same for other up-and-coming professionals?

Dr. Bryce:

I think you don't get to where you are without help. So in my experience, it has been several people who have helped me in this path, from my program director, Pierre Sasson at Mount Auburn Hospital in radiology, different attendings I had there, to here when I became a breast imaging Fellow at Memorial Sloan Kettering with Elizabeth Morris, and she's the one that brought me back to this institution to start my very unique career. My program director, Jim Benenati from Miami Cardiac and Vascular Institute, are all people that I have stood on their shoulders. Janice Newsome from Emory, she just stepped down as Chief from Emory. She has also been somebody who has helped me at very difficult times. And I think starting out here as an attending, my first two years here were very challenging. And that's when I learned the necessity of mentorship.

And, a mentor is someone who, especially when you're in your early career or you're a junior, a mentor is someone who can cover you until you gain your own footing to be able to start climbing. And they're the ones that cover you. And specifically in my situation Ernesto Santos and Etay Ziv were my mentors that helped cover me until I gained my footing to reach the level of accomplishments I have today. So many people have been very instrumental. I've named the ones that stand out, but there are many more. And then beyond that, once you've gained your footing, there are mentors that help you with grant writing or publishing or trial design, procedures, when you want to start a new procedure, practice building—there are different mentors for each category. So as you grow, the mentors will change, but they will probably grow in number.

Samantha Hager:

Will you be attending CIO next month?

Dr. Bryce:

Yes. Yes, definitely.

Samantha Hager:

Okay. So when you attend, what are you most looking forward to? It could be an abstract, presentation, meeting a particular person, etc.

Dr. Bryce:

Oh, at CIO, I am always excited to hear the latest and greatest, what is out there data-wise, what is new, what is cutting edge. I particularly like, in addition to that, the very practical aspects of intervening on these patients. So, they do give all the data, which is great, but they also help define techniques, practical techniques, so that you can be a better doctor immediately upon leaving CIO and going back to your institution. I love that, and then I love seeing familiar faces. A lot of us rotate in this field and we recognize each other. And so, it's an opportunity to catch up with other people that are also interested in caring for these patients in this way.

Samantha Hager:

Lastly, what is one final thing you want our audience of IO professionals to know about you?

Dr. Bryce:

Well, I am a person that is super dedicated to improving outcomes, whether it be improving survival, improving morbidity, or yes, improving quality of life even. And it is a subject that is very multifactorial and very multifaceted that stretches into many areas of care and even beyond medicine and healthcare. And I guess I just want people to know that I am dedicated to being part of the solution rather than the problem.