University of Kansas Earns NCI Cancer Center Designation ▲ NCI Cancer Bulletin for July 24, 2012 - National Cancer Institute

NCI Cancer Bulletin for July 24, 2012 - National Cancer Institute

University of Kansas Earns NCI Cancer Center Designation

The University of Kansas (KU) Cancer Center has been selected for designation as an NCI cancer center. The designation is given to centers that exhibit scientific excellence and the capability to integrate diverse approaches to cancer research.

Richard and Annette Bloch Cancer Care Pavillion at The University of Kansas

The center offers a full range of cancer services, from prevention and diagnosis to treatment and survivorship, for inpatients and outpatients. Through a partnership with Kansas City Cancer Center, patients have access to more than 10 locations with many specialists, technologies, treatment options, and clinical trials.
Clinicians and basic research investigators collaborate through disease-specific working groups to define clinical research priorities, with an emphasis on investigator-initiated trials. These groups focus on lung, gastrointestinal, genitorurinary, head and neck, breast, and brain cancers, as well as hematology/bone marrow transplantation. The center is also part of a network that offers cancer education resources to doctors, researchers, and cancer support professionals.
The National Cancer Advisory Board recommended The University of Kansas Cancer Center for the designation in June. Patients will have access to clinical trials that are available only to NCI-designated cancer centers, and the center will be able to apply for federal research grants only available to NCI-designated cancer centers.
“The National Cancer Institute has recognized our scientific excellence, and the designation validates what we already knew—that research conducted at the University of Kansas Cancer Center is already helping to eliminate the burden of cancer,” said Dr. Roy A. Jensen, director of the KU Cancer Center in a press release. “We are extremely proud of what this designation means.”
“Achieving this designation has been the university’s top research priority because of the benefits it will provide to patients and our region,” said KU Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little.