UT Health San Antonio

Patricia L. M. Dahia, MD, PhD

Tenured Professor

School of Medicine

I am an MD, PhD with clinical training in Endocrinology and Metabolism and laboratory training in Cancer Genetics, Cellular and Molecular Biology. I am a tenured Professor of Medicine at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UTHSCSA) and the Mays Cancer Center at UTHSCSA and the holder of the Robert Tucker Hayes Distinguished Chair in Oncology. My career has focused on research in cancer genetics, with emphasis on pheochromocytomas and paragangliomas. Our work uncovering tumor susceptibility genes (including, SDHB, KIF1B, EPAS1/HIF2A, TMEM127, etc) has had both translational and biological impact. These studies helped define paradigms for pheochromocytoma and paraganglioma classification, genetic testing, patient surveillance, and innovative therapeutic modeling. Our translational and basic research uncovered links between energy metabolism, hypoxia, endosomal/lysosomal signaling and cancer susceptibility.

I have mentored over 50 trainees, many of whom have gone on to independent careers. I have been funded by Federal, State and Private grant agencies. I am currently funded by the NIH, Neuroendocrine Tumor Research Foundation (NETRF) and the VHL Alliance. Ongoing research in my team involves genotype-phenotype studies of pheochromocytoma, paraganglioma and other hereditary cancer predisposition, functional studies of susceptibility genes, and novel disease models, including organoids, to study these tumors.

I am the Director of the recently designated PheoPara Alliance Research and Clinical Center of Excellence at UTHSCSA.