DR. TINA BHATNAGAR

The seeds of Dr. Tina Bhatnagar’s journey to becoming an oncologist were planted in front of the television at her Pittsburgh home.

That journey took her from Georgia to Pennsylvania to Maryland to Ohio and, ultimately, to WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital, where she is the director of Hematology and Medical Oncology at the WVU Cancer Institute. From a young age, she has seen the stress and sadness cancer can bring to others, and has spent her career battling the disease.

As a part of WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital, she has been able to see breakthroughs and triumphs in treating cancer and is excited for what is on the horizon in the Ohio Valley in how to battle it.

Bhatnagar knew early on she wanted a career in medicine, often following her mother, a neurologist, on her hospital rounds. Yet it was her childhood memories of watching human interest television programs like “20/20” that started her down the path of oncology.

“They would oftentimes highlight an oncology patient, sometimes a child who had cancer,” she said, “and I remember just being glued to the television set and having this vast amount of empathy for patients and their families. And I remember watching those shows and thinking that I was going to grow up and help those people.”

That mindset solidified when she watched a high school friend’s younger sister die from cancer. Bhatnagar said she felt a sense of helplessness at that point, not having the tools to help the girl fight the disease, yet he made her even more determined to develop those tools through her education.

Bhatnagar earned a bachelor’s degree from Emory University in Georgia, then earned her doctorate in osteopathic medicine from the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine. Then came an internship and residency at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, then a fellowship in hematology and medical oncology at the University of Maryland’s Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Comprehensive Cancer Center.

While working as an associate professor of internal medicine at The Ohio State University, Bhatnagar decided she wanted to return closer to her family in Pittsburgh. She also became greatly interested in health care disparities, trying to figure out why people in one region aren’t seeing the same healthcare outcomes of people in other regions. Coming to WVU Medicine and WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital helped fulfill both.

What surprised her when she started working in the Ohio Valley was the prevalence of the disease there.

“It’s actually very striking,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting to see as much cancer here as I do, because it’s not a heavily populated area. The cancer rates do seem disproportionate relative to the overall population. Everybody has a relationship with cancer that I’ve seen. They either have a loved one who had it, they themselves have survived it.

“It does worry them,” she continued. “They kind of just think they’re next so I was definitely struck by how common it is in an area that’s not particularly densely populated.”

In working with cancer patients and their families, Bhatnagar feels her personal experiences with the disease have helped her be empathetic toward them, especially family members who might feel the same level of helplessness she did in high school. She tries to tell them that their presence and their support help those cancer patients more than they think.

Bhatnagar is proud of what she and the other physicians at WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital have been able to accomplish in the fight against cancer, and she’s excited for what’s to come, namely the WVU Cancer Institute St. Joseph Regional Cancer Complex that is being built in downtown Wheeling at the former site of Ohio Valley Medical Center. The facility is expected to open in the fall of 2028 and provide state-of-the-art cancer treatment under one roof that will allow cancer patients and their families to stay in familiar surroundings.

“I’m really glad that this regional cancer center is being built,” she said. “I think it will be able to coalesce all of the different specialties that take care of cancer patients – hematology, medical oncology, radiation oncology – and all of the services that utilize to either diagnose or treat cancer patients will finally be under one roof, which I think will make a huge difference, not only in the experience that our patients have, but just also the feel of the entire region.”