27 institutions looking for ways to boost immune system to fight cancer
Newswise — The University of California, San Diego School of Medicine is among 27 research institutions selected across North America to be a part of the Cancer Immunotherapy Trials Network (CITN), funded by the National Cancer Institute (NCI). The CITN will establish a network of top academic immunologists to conduct multicenter research on agents that boost patients’ own immune systems to fight their cancer.
"We are very proud to participate in CITN, which includes sites with some of the foremost research on cancer immunotherapy in the nation,” said Thomas J. Kipps, MD, PhD, professor of medicine at UCSD School of Medicine and deputy director of UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center. “Participation in the network is a two-way street whereby other institutions receive access to trials created at UC San Diego and, alternatively, our patients receive novel advanced investigational treatments created elsewhere in the country. In other words, everyone benefits from this type of arrangement."
By coordinating the efforts of academia, industry and philanthropic foundations, the CITN is charged with accelerating the development of promising agents that have already been discovered but are not currently used to treat patients with cancer.
Institutions applied for member-site status in an open competition followed by a two-stage evaluation process conducted by the NCI. Candidates were evaluated on the experience, participation and collaboration of the investigators and their institutions in immunotherapy trials and their ability to provide laboratory expertise in tumor immunology to support the trials.
In September 2010, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle received funding to serve as the network’s Central Operations and Statistical Office (COSC). The COSC will provide overall leadership and infrastructure for the network. In addition to UC San Diego, the participating institutions include: Baylor University, Case Western Reserve University, Dana Farber Cancer Center, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Norris Cotton Cancer Center, Duke University Medical Center, Emory University, MD Anderson Cancer Center, H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York University Cancer Institute, Ohio State University, Providence Cancer Center, Roswell Park Cancer Center, Rush University Cancer Center, Stanford University, University of California, San Francisco, University of Chicago, University of Miami, University of Minnesota, University of Pennsylvania, University of Pittsburgh, University of Toronto Ontario Cancer Institute, University of Virginia, University of Wisconsin, and Yale University.
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