Ralph H. Hruban, MD, is Professor of Pathology and Oncology at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland USA. He also is the Director of the Sol Goldman Pancreatic Cancer Research Center at Johns Hopkins University.
After receiving an undergraduate degree from the University of Chicago and a medical degree from The Johns Hopkins University, Dr. Hruban continued his residency training in anatomic pathology at Johns Hopkins. He then completed a fellowship in surgical pathology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York and returned to join the faculty at Johns Hopkins in 1990.
Dr. Hruban has authored over 600 peer-reviewed manuscripts and five books including the standard textbook on pancreatic pathology (the AFIP Fascicle on Tumors of the Pancreas) and the World Health Organization “blue book” on tumors of the digestive tract. He is recognized by the Institute for Scientific Information as a Highly Cited Researcher and by Essential Science Indicators as the most highly cited pancreatic cancer scientist. He was recently identified as a “highly influential” biomedical researcher (Euro.J.Clin.Invest.2013,43:1339-65). He helped create the Johns Hopkins Pancreatic Cancer website, http://pathology.jhu.edu/pancreas, an award-winning iPad application (app) to teach pancreas pathology (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/atlas-of-pancreas-pathology/id474845392?mt=8), and an iPad and iPhone app for patients (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/icarebook-hd/id697194060?ls=1&mt=8 ). Dr. Hruban has made these “apps” free to the pancreas community with the goal of improving the practice of pancreas pathology around the world. Dr. Hruban is a member of the Scientific Advisory Boards of The Joseph C. Monastra Foundation, The Michael Rolfe Pancreatic Cancer Foundation, and The Lustgarten Foundation.
Dr. Hruban has received a number of awards including the Arthur Purdy Stout Prize for significant career achievements in surgical pathology, the Ramzi Cotran Award from the United States and Canadian Academy of Pathology, the PanCAN Medical Visionary Award, the Ranice W. Crosby Distinguished Achievement Award in Art as Applied to Medicine, the Ruth C. Brufsky Award of Excellence in Clinical Research for Pancreatic Cancer, the Frank Netter Award for Special Contributions to Medical Education, the Johns Hopkins University Distinguished Alumni Award, the Team Science Award from the American Association for Cancer Research, the Ruth Leff Siegel Award for Pancreatic cancer Research, and five teaching awards from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He was elected to the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina in 2013.
The goals of Dr. Hruban’s research are to understand the noninvasive precursor lesions from which invasive pancreatic cancers develop (PanINs and IPMNs), why pancreatic cancer aggregates in some families, and the pathologic ramifications of genetic alterations in the pancreas. Towards these goals Dr. Hruban has applied molecular genetics to the study of noninvasive precursor lesions in the pancreas and to patients with familial pancreatic cancer. A better understanding of these lesions and families may provide an avenue for the early detection of pancreatic cancer.
Dr. Hruban is also an expert in medical history, and produced an award-winning documentary on William Stewart Halsted, M.D. (http://HalstedTheDocumentary.org) and a series of popular “Osler Minutes,” on the philosophy of William Osler, M.D. (http://pathology.jhu.edu/department/about/history/osler-minutes.cfm).