Rebecca Heist, MD, MPH, is a distinguished leader in medical oncology and clinical cancer research at the Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute. She has been a member of the Massachusetts General Hospital faculty since 2005 and is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Lee Albright and Nile Albright, MD, Endowed Chair in Clinical Cancer Research. Dr. Heist is widely recognized for her leadership in the development of novel cancer therapeutics, including targeted therapies for MET exon skipping that have transformed the care for patients with MET-altered lung cancer. She has led early-phase development of multiple antibody–drug conjugates now approved by the FDA and has advanced cooperative group and investigator-initiated studies across medical, radiation, and surgical oncology.
Dr. Heist earned her undergraduate degree from Harvard University and her MD from Harvard Medical School. She completed her residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and fellowship in Hematology-Oncology at the combined Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Massachusetts General Hospital/Dana-Farber Cancer Institute program. Deeply committed to translational science, her work focuses on new drug development and understanding mechanisms of response and resistance to cancer therapies and on developing innovative programs that accelerate clinical trial development and expand access to trials.
