Dr. Philip Adeeb Salem is a world renowned cancer researcher, educator and physician. He is currently the Director of Cancer Research at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in Houston, Texas.  Before he joined St. Luke’s Hospital in 1991, Dr. Salem was professor of cancer medicine and research at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Centre. He graduated from the Medical School of the American University of Beirut in June 1965, and he did his residency in internal medicine at its University Hospital. In June 1968, he joined Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre for training in cancer medicine and research. After two years in New York, he moved to Houston to join the M. D. Anderson Cancer Centre. He returned to the American University of Beirut in September 1971, and he established the first cancer research and treatment program in the Arab World. He remained in Beirut until 1986. During his tenure at the American University of Beirut he published extensively on a newly described disease, Immunoproliferative Small Intestinal Disease, a kind of the mucosa-associated lymphoid neoplasms. His research which he started in the early seventies was recently considered as the gateway for the research on the link between infections and cancer in the gastro-intestinal tract, which led to the granting of the Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine for the year 2005 to two Australian doctors. He serves on the editorial board of several cancer research journals.

In addition to his professional career in cancer medicine and research, Dr. Salem is the recipient of the Senatorial Medal of Freedom from the United States Congress and the Ellis Island Medal of Honor by the National Ethnic Coalition Organizations (NECO) for his “exceptional humanitarian efforts and outstanding contributions to America”. In July 2004, a book entitled, “Philip Salem, The Man, The Homeland, The Knowledge”, authored by Peter Indari, an Australian journalist, was launched in Beirut, Lebanon.