Lung cancer is a devastating disease with an annual mortality rate higher than breast, colon and prostate cancer combined. This alarming statistic, and the loss of my own grandfather to lung cancer several years ago, is what fuels my commitment to advance new therapies that may improve patient outcomes and prolong lives.

3D- render of a germ bacteria under a microscope

I carpool with a colleague, Brenda. She and I work in different areas of R&D, grew up on different continents and have different tastes in food. But, despite our diverse backgrounds, Brenda and I have bonded over personal tales of our countries, communities, families, work, travel – and our mutual love of stories about strong empowering women. We especially enjoy stories of women lifting up other women.

In our ever-evolving health care landscape, where patients’ desire for improved health and researchers’ ability to innovate grow in tandem, the medical industry is becoming more and more equipped to deliver transformational diagnostics and treatments. But there remain gaps in the knowledge of the risk and timing for the development and onset of many diseases.

In my work at Janssen Immunology supporting clinical development of medicines for patients with psoriatic arthritis (PsA), I get an opportunity to think a lot about how these patients’ daily lives are impacted by their disease.

Understanding the intricacies of psoriasis and how therapies act on the disease can help to inform clinicians and their patients as they seek to make important treatment decisions.

In this post, Janssen’s Dr. Allitia Di Bernardo looks at how Janssen is fighting to prevent Ebola outbreaks before they begin.