At Moffitt Cancer Center, G. Douglas Letson, MD, has been appointed Executive Vice President for Clinical Affairs and Physician-in-Chief, and Johnathan Lancaster, MD, PhD, has been appointed President of the Moffitt Medical Group (charged with overseeing the medical practice of physicians and health care professionals).
As Sarcoma Program leader, Letson, an orthopedic surgeon and musculoskeletal tumor specialist, has developed the largest program of its kind in Florida and the Southeast. Lancaster, a gynecologic oncologist and Deputy Physician-in-Chief and Chair of the Department of Women's Oncology, currently leads a multidisciplinary women's cancer research team and oversees a translational research lab focused on ovarian and gynecological malignancies.
Earlier this year, Moffitt had announced these additional organizational changes (OT, 3/25/12): William S. Dalton, PhD, MD, current President and CEO, will become the new CEO of M2Gen Personalized Medicine Institute, a Moffitt subsidiary focused on personalizing cancer care; Alan List, MD, Executive Vice President and Physician-in-Chief, will become Moffitt CEO; and Thomas A. Sellers, PhD, will become the Center Director.
All the changes will take effect next month.
The Academy of Medical Sciences of the UK has elected 46 medical researchers to the Fellowship of the Academy of Medical Sciences. "These new Fellows represent the wealth of talent within the UK biomedical community," said Professor Sir John Tooke, PMedSci, President of the Academy of Medical Sciences, in a news release. The new fellows include the following members of the oncology community:
* Johann de Bono, FMedSci, Professor of Experimental Cancer Medicine, Institute of Cancer Research and Honorary Consultant Medical Oncologist, Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust
* Rosalind Eeles, FMedSci, Professor of Oncogenetics, Institute of Cancer Research & Honorary Consultant in Clinical Oncology, Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust
* Patrick Johnston, FMedSci, Dean of Medicine, Queen's University Belfast
* Kathy Pritchard-Jones, FMedSci, Professor of Pediatric Oncology, University College London Institute of Child Health, and Honorary Consultant Oncologist, Great Ormond Street Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and UCL.
Maureen T. Kavanah, MD, Associate Professor of Surgery at Boston University School of Medicine and Surgical Oncologist at Boston Medical Center (BMC), has received the 2012 National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project Distinguished Investigator Lifetime Achievement Award for her research contributions in breast and colorectal cancers.
She has been a research investigator with the NSABP since 1981, during which time she has been principal investigator of the project's Clinical Research at BMC; led NSABP-sponsored clinical studies in breast and bowel cancers, served on the Board of Directors (since 1988); and serves as the Chairman of the Ethics Committee. She also established BMC as a full-member institution of the Southwest Oncology Group in 1990 and was principal investigator until 1994.
Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil, Professor in the Department of Breast Medical Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, has been appointed Director of the Breast Cancer Research Group and Co-director of the Cancer Genetics Research Program at Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale-New Haven Hospital, a change that will take effect in August.
Eward C. Halperin, MD, MA, has become Chancellor for Health Affairs and Chief Executive Officer at New York Medical College; he was also named Provost for Biomedical Affairs for the Touro College and University System, which acquired New York Medical College in 2011. He was most recently Dean at the University of Louisville School of Medicine. He assumed his new positions in May.
The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center has renewed its agreement with the Norwegian Cancer Consortium (NCC), keeping it part of the MDACC Sister Institution Network, founded in 2007 as a global, academic network of cancer centers, hospitals, and universities collaborating to lessen the world's cancer burden. The NCC is comprised of Oslo University Hospital, Stavanger University Hospital and The Cancer Registry of Norway with programs specializing in biochemistry, cell and tumor biology, genetics, radiation biology, immunology, cancer prevention, personalized breast cancer therapy, GI surgery, and hematology.
"Our partners in Norway provide great strategic opportunities to engage in research," said Oliver Bogler, PhD, Vice President of Global Academic Programs at MD Anderson. "The ability of the Norwegian Cancer Registry to capture the entire medical history of the Norwegian population is research that we can't do in the U.S."
Seattle's Swedish Medical Center has opened the True Family Women's Cancer Center, to consolidate and coordinate care services for women with cancer. The center is funded by a $2 million gift from Jane True and her family, and an additional $10 million in other donations.
Patricia L. Dawson, MD, PhD, is the center's first Medical Director. Before this role, she was a breast surgeon with the Swedish Cancer Institute.
The newly created Oncology service line for the MedStar Health Baltimore region has appointed Stephen Noga, MD, PhD, as Medical Director and Phyllis Gray, MS, as Regional Vice President. The new service line will integrate cancer services among MedStar's four Baltimore hospitals.
Noga will continue as Chief of Hematology at the MedStar Franklin Square Medical Center, where he developed a Blood Disorders Division. Gray most recently served as Director of the Oncology service line at MedStar Good Samaritan and MedStar Union Memorial hospitals.
Elisa Oricchio, PhD, Research Fellow at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, has been named a winner in the New York Academy of Sciences' 2012 Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists Competition. She received a $15,000 prize for identifying a new molecular target for lymphoma therapy in her clinical medicine work at the Wendel Lab at MSKCC.
"There are a few awards for young scientists, but almost all of them are based on proposals that you submit, and not on the actual work that you do as a young scientist," 2010 Blavatnik Awards faculty winner Michal Lipson, MacArthur Fellow and Associate Professor in the Nanophotonics Research Group at Cornell University, noted in a statement. "[The Blavatnik Awards are] a true recognition of the work of young scientists; it is unique in that sense. There is no equivalent."
The competition is open to researchers under age 42, pursing research in the life sciences, physical sciences, mathematics, or engineering. Nine winners and two finalists were chosen out of 170 nominations.
Alexander Drilon, MD, a fellow at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, has received the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer Fellowship Award, an $80,000 grant given over two years for his research on the genetic rearrangement of the RET gene to eventually develop new lung cancer therapies.
The Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group Research and Education Foundation has announced the following recipients of its annual research awards for young investigators researching the causes and treatments of neoplastic diseases:
* Bryan P. Schneider, MD, received the Young Investigator Award for his research on breast cancer biomarkers that identified two single nucleotide polymorphisms with VEGF that predicted increased breast cancer risk and angiogenesis-specific SNPs related to bevacizumab therapy. He is Associate Professor of Medicine in the Department of Medicine's Division of Hematology/Oncology and Clinical Pharmacology and the Department of Medical and Molecular Genetics at Indiana University School of Medicine. An ECOG member since 2007, he is a member of ECOG's Breast Committee, as well as the Developmental Therapeutics Committee, where he serves as Vice-Chair of the Pharmacogenetics Sub-Committee.
* David L. Bajor, MD, received the Paul Carbone, MD Fellowship Award for his investigation into the clinical and immunological impact of CD40 monoclonal antibody in patients with resectable pancreatic adenocarcinoma. He is a Hematology/Oncology Fellow at Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
Sandra Rome, RN, MN, AOCN, Clinical Nurse Specialist in Hematology and Oncology at Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute, has received the Distinguished Alumni Award from the UCLA School of Nursing for raising awareness of the critical role nurses play in the nation's health care system. She has been at Cedars-Sinai since 1991 and currently oversees 100 nurses in the Medical Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplant Unit there and is also Assistant Clinical Professor on the UCLA School of Nursing Faculty.
The Intel International Science and Engineering Fair awarded its top prize to 15-year-old Jack Andraka, of Crownsville, Maryland, who won $75,000, for developing a blood or urine test to find pancreatic cancer with 90 percent accuracy. The test is 28 times cheaper and faster than less-sensitive tests. The competition run by the non-profit Society for Science & the Public included more than 1,500 students from 70 nations.
The Oncology Nursing Society has announced the following awards given by the Oncology Nursing Certification Corporation:
* Sylvia Danko, RN, OCN, CBCN, has been named Oncology Certified Nurse of the Year for her service to and support for certification in oncology nursing, and being a leader throughout the Central Texas community she serves. She is a network oncology nurse educator at Seton Healthcare Family in Austin.
* Kelly Smith, MSN, RN, NP, AOCN, has been selected Advanced Oncology Certified Nurse of the Year for her support and promotion of oncology nursing certification in her institution, chapter, and community. A nurse practitioner and genetic educator at West Michigan Cancer Center in Kalamazoo, she helped develop multidisciplinary breast cancer, neuro-oncology, and cancer risk assessment programs at her facility, and provides educational programs to her institution and area hospitals.
Cleveland Clinic's Stanley Shalom Zielony Institute for Nursing Excellence received a $1 million endowment from Samuel and Maria Miller, which will formally establish the Sam and Maria Miller Nursing Excellence Awards to annually recognize 95 nurses at the institution.
"Nurses have unfailing vigor, kindness and generosity and will forever be remembered by their patients. Cleveland Clinic patients will always know how the Cleveland Clinic organization and its nurses have aided them," Mr. Miller said in a statement. He and his wife have supported advances in several specialties at the clinic since 1983, and he also serves as a Trustee and member of the Board of Directors.
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