Larry K. Kvols

Larry K. Kvols, MD is Professor Emeritus of Internal Medicine at Moffitt Cancer Center and University of South Florida and the founding director of Moffitt's Neuroendocrine Tumor Program, which grew under his leadership into one of the largest and most active NET programs in the United States. A pioneer of the modern NET field, Dr. Kvols conducted the landmark early clinical studies at Mayo Clinic in the 1980s demonstrating that octreotide, a synthetic somatostatin analogue, could dramatically control the debilitating symptoms of carcinoid syndrome — work that fundamentally changed the standard of care for patients with functional NETs and set the stage for the entire class of somatostatin analogue therapies. Dr. Kvols also performed the foundational US studies of I-131 MIBG (meta-iodobenzylguanidine) therapy in neuroendocrine tumors and pheochromocytomas at Mayo Clinic in collaboration with nuclear medicine colleagues, establishing early evidence for targeted radionuclide therapy in NETs decades before PRRT became available. His subsequent streptozocin and chemotherapy trials at Mayo and Moffitt established benchmarks for cytotoxic therapy in islet cell carcinoma and provided the historical comparator data against which modern pNET trials have been designed. Widely regarded as a founding father of clinical NET oncology in the United States, Dr. Kvols co-founded NANETS and served on its inaugural board, mentored multiple generations of NET specialists, and has been recognized with lifetime achievement awards from NANETS, the Carcinoid Cancer Foundation, and the International NET Research Foundation. He has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles over his career.