Interests:

Developing predictive models of head and neck tumor metastasis from sparse data sources using formal anatomic knowledge representations and the genomics of head and neck tumors (squamous cell carcinoma, infantile hemangiomas, lymphatic malformations).

Background:

Dr. Whipple received his BS degree in Biological Sciences from Stanford University and his MD degree from the University of Washington School of Medicine.  He completed his residency training in Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery at the University of Illinois and his MS degree in Medical Informatics from the Harvard-MIT program.  He practices Otolaryngology-Head & Neck surgery and serves as the chief of service at Harborview Medical Center.  He served as co-director of the Biocommons Computing Center.  Dr. Whipple is a national leader in the movement to develop medical school learning communities (LCs).  He currently serves as the Director of the UW School of Medicine Colleges and is the Chair of the Learning Communities Institute, an organization of North American medical school LCs.  His research activities have included developing algorithms for prediction and analysis of head and neck tumor development  and metastasis.

Research:

Developing predictive models of head and neck tumor metastasis from sparse data sources using formal anatomic knowledge representations.  Genomics of head and neck tumors (squamous cell carcinoma, infantile hemangiomas, lymphatic malformations).

Representative publications:

• Kalet IJ, Whipple M, Pessah S, Barker J, Austin-Seymour MM, Shapiro LG. A rule based model for local and regional tumor spread. Proc AMIA Symp. 2002: 360-4.
• Kuo WP, Mendez E, Chen C, Whipple ME, Farwell DG, Agoff N, Park PJ. Functional relationship between gene pairs in oral squamous cell carcinoma. Proc AMIA Symp. 2003; 371-5.
• Whipple ME, Mendez E, Farwell DG, Chen C. A log likelihood predictor for genomic classification of oral cancer using principal component analysis for feature selection. MedInfo 2004;2004: 823-8.
• Benson N, Whipple M, Kalet IJ. A markov model approach to predicting regional tumor spread in the lymphatic system of the head and neck. AMIA Annu Symp Proc. 2006:31-5.
• Kalet IJ, Mejino JL, Wang, V, Whipple M, Brinkley JF. Content-specific auditing of a large scale anatomy ontology. J Biomed Inform. 2009 Jun;42(3):540-9.
• Wang LL, Grunblatt E, Jung H, Kalet IJ, Whipple ME.  Biological model development as an opportunity to provide content auditing for the Foundational Model of Anatomy ontology.  AMIA Annu Symp Proc. 2015 Nov 5;2015:2111-20. PMID: 26958311
• Jung H, Law A, Grunblatt E, Wang LL, Kusano A, Mejino JLV, Whipple ME.  Development of a novel markov chain model for the prediction of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma dissemination.  AMIA Annu Symp Proc. 2017 Feb 10;2016:1832-1839.  PMID: 28269942
• Wu S, Law A, Whipple ME.  A Bayesian network model of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma incorporating gene expression profiles.  Stud Health Technol Inform. 2017;245:634-638.  PMID: 29295173