Most patients never meet the person who actually diagnoses their cancer. In this episode of Decoding a Cure, host Rhea Morani talks with Dr. Linda Green, Professor of Pathology at Baylor College of Medicine and Director of Cytopathology and Flow Cytometry at the Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center in Houston. She's a pathologist who has spent nearly 40 years working the side of medicine that happens under a microscope, out of sight but rarely out of mind for the doctors who depend on her.

Dr. Green walks us through what it's actually like to be the "doctor's doctor," the specialist surgeons and oncologists call when they need to know, definitively, what they're dealing with. She describes the strange, careful science of turning a biopsy into an answer: formaldehyde, hot wax, paper-thin slices, and dye that makes invisible cells suddenly legible.

In this episode, we talk about:

• How a single needle biopsy can sometimes save a patient's thyroid, or their lung, without surgery
• Why cervical and thyroid screening can catch disease before it ever becomes cancer
• Why fewer autopsies are being performed today than ever before, and what that quietly says about how medicine has changed
• Her decades treating veterans at the VA, including how wartime cigarette rations shaped a generation's health, and how hepatitis C screening changed outcomes for thousands
• Where AI is already proving useful in the pathology lab, where it's dangerously overconfident, and why Dr. Green believes human judgment, not pattern matching, is still what makes a diagnosis trustworthy

If you've ever wondered what happens to your sample after it leaves the room, or what it really takes to catch a cancer before it becomes one, this episode is for you!

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In this episode of Decoding a Cure, host Rhea Morani sits down with world-renowned radiologist Dr. Priya Bhosale, Professor of Radiology and Clinical Co-Director of the Quantitative Imaging Analysis Core (QIAC) at the UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, consistently ranked as the world's #1 cancer canter. They bridge the gap between complex computer science and frontline oncology to explore how advanced technology is rewriting the rules of cancer care.

In this episode, we decode:

• How radiologists are using artificial intelligence and quantitative imaging (radiomics) to predict treatment responses before traditional scans can see visible changes.

• The inspiration behind Dr. Bhosale’s recent National Science Foundation (NSF) grant for a novel MR imaging applicator, as well as the uses of the applicator

• How advanced MRI and PET/CT imaging are used to catch aggressive gynecological and pancreatic malignancies early.

• The critical ethical risks and limitations of integrating AI into modern medicine.

Whether you're a student, professional, or just curious about the future of healthcare, this conversation reveals exactly what it takes to merge data science with human biology to save lives.

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