Dr Thomas Soh

Dr Thomas Soh is a Senior Consultant Medical Oncologist at OncoCare Cancer Centre. His subspecialty interest is in Gastrointestinal (oesophageal, gastric, colon, and rectal cancer) and Hepatobiliary Cancer (liver, pancreas, bile duct, and gallbladder cancers). He is also a cancer specialist who looks after patients with neuroendocrine cancers and GIST. He has more than 20 years of clinical practice.

He graduated from the National University of Singapore in 2003 and received his Membership of the Royal College of Physicians (United Kingdom) in 2007. He later completed his advanced specialist training in Medical Oncology in 2012.

Before entering private practice, Dr Soh was previously a Consultant at the Department of Haematology Oncology at the National University Hospital(NUH) and a Visiting Consultant at Ng Teng Fong General Hospital.

He was heavily involved in both undergraduate and postgraduate education and was core faculty for both the Internal Medicine Residency program and the Oncology Senior Residency program at the National University Hospital from 2012 to 2016.  He was recognised for his mentorship as a good teacher to junior doctors and medical students, with the Teaching Excellence Award in 2014, from the National University Cancer Institute (NCIS), as well as the Best Tutor Award in 2015 for undergraduate teaching by the University Medical Cluster, NUH.

Dr Soh believes in the delivery of quality healthcare and was the lead and co-lead in several healthcare improvement projects. He had received multiple awards for his involvement in the Clinical Practice Improvement Programmes that he had implemented at NUH. From 2013-2015, he contributed to a leading role being the Honorary Secretary of the Executive Committee, of the Singapore Society of Oncology.

Dr Soh is actively involved in both research and education in cancer medicine. He had received funding for his work from the National Medical Research Council, Singapore, being awarded the Clinical Investigator Salary Support Program (CISSP) award 3 times. He had researched drug response and toxicity in treating cancer, understanding how chemotherapy and targeted medications are absorbed and cleared in the body concerning pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics. He had published on genetic variants affecting chemotherapy in Asian cancer patients. His research publication in colorectal cancer involves working with cell-free DNA, chemotherapy drugs Regorafenib, and FOLFIRI regimen (irinotecan, 5-fluorouracil, and folinic acid).

He was the principal investigator in several multi-centre gastrointestinal cancer clinical trials and his research work has led to more than 20 publications in high-impact medical and oncology journals. He was the Principal Investigator for studies of circulating tumour cells and was also doing trials in hepatocellular cancer (hepatoma) with drugs such as Sorafenib, Lenvatinib, Carbozantinib. The colorectal cancer trials involved drugs such as Cetuximab (Erbitux) with FOLFOX (Oxaliplatin, 5-fluorouracil and folinic acid), FOLFIRI regimens, Aflibercept, and Y90 (Therasphere). In advanced pancreatic cancer, he was the principal investigator for studies using Gemcitabine, Masitinib, and Abraxane. These experiences stand him in good stead to care for cancer patients and he is recognised for his dedication and expertise in these areas.

Dr Soh speaks fluent English, Mandarin, Malay, Bahasa Indonesia as well as Hokkien and has looked after many Indonesian and Malay patients. He has looked after many international patients, including Vietnamese, Myanmar, Bangladeshi, and Cambodian patients as well, with the help of interpreters.