Pei-Rong Ding, MD, PhD

Scott R. Steele, MD, MBA, FACS, FASCRS, FPSCRS (Hon.)

Dr. Pei-Rong Ding is a Professor of Surgery and Attending Physician at Sun Yat-Sen Cancer Center in Guangzhou, China. He was born and raised in Chaozhou (i.e., Teochew) City, an ancient city with a rich culture in southern China. He obtained both his undergraduate and medical degrees from Sun Yat-Sen University in Guangzhou, China. Along the way, he served as a research fellow at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center from 2009 to 2010, focusing on colorectal cancer—something that has carried his interests through his entire career. Since then, he has developed a particular niche within colorectal cancer, focusing on helping families who suffer from hereditary colorectal cancer, and improving their prognosis and minimizing their family risk. He has also set up both a fund as well as a registry focusing on this aspect.

His clinical research focuses on optimizing the screening and management of hereditary colorectal cancer and optimizing the neoadjuvant strategy for locally advanced rectal cancer. He leads several randomized clinical trials, including using programmed death protein 1 (PD-1) antibody for prevention of adenoma and secondary malignancy, and adjuvant immunotherapy using PD-1 antibody for stage 3 MSI-H (microsatellite instability-high) colorectal cancer. He is also the principal investigator of the prospective randomized trial CONVERT, which is aimed at individualizing rectal cancer treatment to improve outcomes and reduce treatment-related toxicity. His laboratory research focuses on understanding both hereditary colorectal cancer syndromes and early-onset colorectal cancer, and the impact of microenvironment on immunotherapy of colorectal cancer.

As corresponding or first author, he has published more than 100 papers in peer-reviewed journals such as Cell Res, Annals of Surgery, Journal of the NCI, European Journal of Cancer, OncoImmunology, and others.

He has also served as the Vice President of the Society of Hereditary Cancer, Chinese Anti-Cancer Association; the Vice President of Committee of Youth Experts, Chinese Society of Clinical Oncology; the President of the Society of Hereditary Tumor Committee, Guangdong Province Anti-Cancer Association.

Away from medicine, he is married to his wife, Xin An, who is a medical oncologist. They have two lovely children, Mingze and Anyi, and they live in Guangzhou city in South China. In his free time, he enjoys travelling, swimming, skiing, and reading.

On a personal note, I have known Pei-Rong for over a decade and have traveled to China to spend time and learn from him several times. I have been lucky enough to be a collaborator on some of his research, and it has been wonderful to watch him evolve into an emerging global thought-leader in colorectal surgery and especially those patients with hereditary disease in such a rapid time. On behalf of the readers and staff of Clinics in Colon and Rectal Surgery, I want to sincerely thank Dr. Ding for serving as a Guest Editor and for providing us with an incredible issue on Advancements in the Application of Molecular Profiling in Colorectal Cancer Surgery.

Publication History

Article published online:
09 April 2023