Rachna Shroff

Rachna Shroff died on October 11, 2026, at the age of 47, after an aggressive cancer. The date was reported by The Cancer Letter, quoting the University of Arizona's internal announcement; some news reports published on October 13 gave that day instead. The place of death and the specific medical cause have not been made public. While she was living, The Cancer Letter reported that she had cancer of unknown primary.

In the weeks before her death she had stepped back from work to focus on her health and on the endowment campaign for the young investigator award that bears her name, which passed its $1.35 million goal in early October.

The University of Arizona announced her death on Monday, October 12, 2026, in messages from the College of Medicine - Tucson, the Cancer Center and University of Arizona News. ASCO, the Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation, The Cancer Letter and many oncologists paid tribute on October 13. Funeral or memorial arrangements have not been made public. She is survived by her husband, Dr. Puneet Shroff; children, Simran and Sachin; parents, Devendar Trivedi and Dr. Amita Trivedi; and sister, Neema Sahni.

Rachna Shroff, born Rachna Trivedi, grew up in Tucson, Arizona. Her father, Devendar Trivedi, was a biochemist and her mother, Dr. Amita Trivedi, was a nephrologist. The University of Arizona wrote that, as the daughter of a nephrologist and a biochemist, young Rachna knew she wanted to meld scientific discovery with her innate sense of compassion.

Her interest in cancer research began in her hometown. In 1993, as a high school student, she won the Osler Fellowship, which gave her the chance to work in the University of Arizona Cancer Center laboratory of College of Medicine - Tucson professor Margaret Briehl. A photograph from that summer shows the 14-year-old Rachna Trivedi with Briehl, research technician Jeanne Morreale and postdoctoral researcher Dr. Linda Siemankowski. She also danced from childhood, a passion she kept for the rest of her life. Her exact date and place of birth have not been made public.

Shroff earned a Bachelor of Science in biochemistry from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, in 2000. She received her Doctor of Medicine from Thomas Jefferson University's Sidney Kimmel Medical College in Philadelphia in 2004.

She completed an internal medicine residency at Washington University in St. Louis and Barnes-Jewish Hospital from 2004 to 2007, then a medical oncology fellowship at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston from 2007 to 2010. In 2012 she added a Master of Science in patient-based biological research from the University of Texas Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences in Houston. She was board certified in internal medicine and medical oncology by the American Board of Internal Medicine.

She later said she loved cancer biology when she did bench research as a biochemistry major, and that her medicine rotation on the oncology wards in medical school was the first time she felt this was the patient population she wanted to help.

After her fellowship, Shroff joined the faculty of the Department of GI Medical Oncology at MD Anderson Cancer Center, where she worked from 2010 to 2018 and became an associate professor. The Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation credited her with helping to build one of the nation's largest clinical and research programs in biliary tract cancer there. She credited her development as a physician-scientist to the mentorship of Dr. Robert Wolff, and remembered her MD Anderson chair, Dr. Jim Abbruzzese, telling her that a career "is a marathon, not a sprint."

In 2018 she was recruited back to Tucson by the University of Arizona. Over nearly a decade there she held a series of senior roles: associate director of clinical investigations and co-leader of the Gastrointestinal Clinical Research Team at the University of Arizona Cancer Center; tenured professor in the Department of Medicine; associate dean for clinical and translational research at the College of Medicine - Tucson for three years; chief of the Division of Hematology/Oncology; and medical director of the Oncology Service Line at Banner - University Medicine. She was also a member of the BIO5 Institute and held NCI peer-reviewed funding to expand clinical research across Arizona.

Her research focused on new therapies for pancreatic and hepatobiliary cancers, especially cholangiocarcinoma. She led a phase 2 trial showing promising survival with gemcitabine, cisplatin and nab-paclitaxel, then served as national principal investigator of SWOG S1815, the first randomized phase 3 trial in biliary tract cancers in the United States. It enrolled 441 eligible patients at more than 150 sites in just over two years; she presented the results at the 2023 ASCO Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium and they were published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology in 2024. She also led the 2019 ASCO clinical practice guideline on adjuvant therapy for resected biliary tract cancer and co-authored a 2020 Lancet seminar on pancreatic cancer. In all she authored more than 80 publications, including work that contributed to FDA approvals, and spoke at more than 130 professional engagements.

Nationally she co-chaired the SWOG Hepatobiliary Subcommittee, chaired the 2024 ASCO Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium, served on the Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation's Scientific and Medical Advisory Board, and took part in steering committees of the Association of American Cancer Institutes. Within ASCO she completed the 2021-2022 Leadership Development Program, was elected to the Nominating Committee (2022-2024), chaired the Cancer Communications Committee, was an associate editor of ASCO Daily News, and sat on the ASCO Meeting & Member Publications Editorial Board.

Shroff was married to Dr. Puneet Shroff, professor of medicine and associate director of the Banner Medical Group's Allergy Clinic in Tucson. They had two children, Simran and Sachin, and a dog named Zeus. In a 2024 interview she called her husband and children the three most important people in her life, and said she was happiest with her family, wherever they were, even just driving the children to school.

Dance was a lifelong outlet. She performed with a Bollywood dance troupe representing the Anjali Center in Houston, and joked that if she had not gone into oncology she might have been a professional party planner or a Bollywood dancer. She exercised first thing every morning, loved travelling with her family, and described herself as an extrovert energised by people. In 2014 she and her husband posed on the red carpet at the Academy Awards in Los Angeles. Among her close friendships was one with businesswoman and entrepreneur Ginny L. Clements. Her sister is Neema Sahni.

Shroff described herself as an eternal optimist. Her personal motto was "If you can't find the sunshine, be the sunshine," which she said guided her in helping people see the positive while also fuelling her own energy.

She believed clinical trials should be part of routine cancer care. She said it was "our role and responsibility" to have trials available to patients, ideally one for every person who came through the clinic door, and she spent her University of Arizona years extending trial access across Southern Arizona.

She was also a strong advocate for women in oncology. She recalled being told as a junior faculty member that, as a woman, she had "sharp elbows" for speaking up, and said the experience drove her passion for supporting, uplifting and amplifying women in the field. Her dream ASCO panel, she said, would feature trailblazers such as Dr. Margaret Tempero, Dr. Lori J. Pierce and Dr. Edith P. Mitchell. She regularly mentored young researchers through ASCO's Virtual Mentoring Program, Oncology Summer Internship and Women's Networking Center.

When Shroff began working on cholangiocarcinoma, there were few treatment options and no FDA-approved therapies for the disease. The University of Arizona wrote that the field has since changed dramatically, due in part to the landmark clinical trials she led as a principal investigator, and the Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation said she made tangible differences for patients and their families throughout her career.

Her most personal legacy is the Conquer Cancer Rachna Shroff, MD, MS, FASCO Endowed Young Investigator Award in Biliary Cancers. In September 2026, facing her own life-limiting cancer, she set out to raise $1.35 million to fund the award permanently. Within weeks more than 600 donors from across the oncology community, along with friends, patients and advocates, had passed the goal. Conquer Cancer board member Deanna van Gestel called the pace "unprecedented." The award will support early-career scientists in biliary cancer research for years to come, building on an earlier Conquer Cancer Merit Award she and her husband had endowed. Further gifts will continue to grow the endowment, and ASCO has invited people to donate to Conquer Cancer in her memory.

At the University of Arizona she also leaves behind the high-performing gastrointestinal oncology program she built, wider clinical trial access across Southern Arizona, and the many young investigators she mentored.

Shroff's honours included:

• Osler Fellowship, University of Arizona Cancer Center (1993, as a high school student)
• Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation, Young Investigator Award (early career)
• College of Medicine Faculty Mentoring Awards, University of Arizona (2022)
• Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, FASCO (2023)
• University of Arizona Cancer Center Award for Clinical Excellence (2024)
• Mark R. Clements Award for Vision, Innovation, and Collaboration, Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation
• Inaugural John F. and Valli S. Duval Endowed Professor for Gastrointestinal Oncology, University of Arizona College of Medicine - Tucson (invested March 2026)

In 2024 she was also honoured by the Cancer Center at an Arizona Wildcats football game against West Virginia.

Shroff was a frequent explainer of new cancer research for both doctors and the public. She gave many video interviews to OncLive, OBR Oncology and Targeted Oncology on molecular profiling and targeted therapy in cholangiocarcinoma, appeared on podcasts including the Seena Magowitz Foundation's pancreatic cancer podcast, and spoke at Cholangiocarcinoma Foundation annual conferences, including a 2021 talk titled "Closing the GAP."

In June 2026 she presented ASCO's "First Look" video analysis of the EMERALD-3 liver cancer trial from the ASCO Annual Meeting, and joined Stephanie Sy on PBS NewsHour to discuss a promising once-daily drug for pancreatic cancer. As an ASCO Daily News associate editor and chair of ASCO's Cancer Communications Committee, she also helped shape how the society shared research news. In 2024 ASCO Connection profiled her in its "Meet" series.