Miss Larissa Vaz Goncalves

Principal advisor: Professor Marina Reeves

Co-supervisor team: Dr Melinda Protani, Dr Jodi Sanus, and Dr Louise Marquart-Wilson

Division: Health Promotion and Equity

Larissa is a Nutritionist, having obtained a master's in Health Science in Brazil (where she is from). Larissa completed her PhD at the School of Public Health, The University of Queensland. 

Larissa’s thesis focuses specifically on triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), the most aggressive type of breast cancer, with limited treatment options and the poorest prognosis. Her systematic review and meta-analysis (published in BCRT, 2024) showed for the first time that excess body weight is not only associated with poor prognosis but that this differs by continent/ethnicity. This is crucial for tailoring recommendations and targeting interventions for women with TNBC. 

She also examined incidence and survival outcomes across breast cancer subtypes in real-world data from women diagnosed in Queensland between 2017-12019. Based on the results (paper published in JPC, 2025), HR+/HER2- breast cancer is the most common subtype and has the best short-term prognosis. TNBC has markedly poorer short-term survival, even when diagnosed at an early stage. This study provides real-world data for benchmarking breast cancer incidence and survival, and highlights the importance of capturing receptor status and stage for cancer surveillance.

Larissa's third study looked at the TNBC population-based data around receipt of neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) in Queensland, which is the primary recommended therapy for TNBC, even for small tumours, and survival outcomes. The results suggest that a small proportion of women received neoadjuvant treatment, from those, ~36% achieved pathological complete response. Residential location influenced NAC receipt. Over time, women who received NAC and achieved pCR had a clear survival advantage compared to those who did not receive NAC. Paper submitted for publication, 2025.  

Larissa is passionate about working on research focused on cancer prevention and improving outcomes.