Nevada Cancer Institute's Goal to Become a Comprehensive Cancer Center
In order to best serve Nevadans, a primary goal of Nevada Cancer Institute since its founding has been to earn the designation Comprehensive Cancer Center from the National Cancer Institute (NCI). NCI-designated cancer centers are world leaders in cancer research and are the sources of more effective approaches to cancer prevention, diagnosis and treatment. Comprehensive Cancer Centers like MD Anderson, Moffitt, UCLA, City of Hope and Memorial Sloan Kettering are renowned both for their research and the quality of their patient care. Nevada Cancer Institute remains committed to its goal of earning this distinction.
The National Cancer Institute
Congress created the NCI in 1937 to conduct and foster cancer research; analyze and disseminate the results of research; and provide cancer training and education. The Cancer Centers Branch of the NCI was formally established in 1971 specifically to heighten the potential for scientific discovery, and promote and support translational research - the application of research discoveries to directly improved care for cancer patients.
How Does a Cancer Institute Become an NCI-designated Center?
The underlying purpose of the NCI designation is for the institution to facilitate the coming together of researchers across the spectra of their interests and techniques to move the battle against cancer in new directions. To qualify for consideration, an institution must have demonstrated significant levels of research funded by the NCI and other competitive sources, usually at least $10 million per year in such funding. The institution must demonstrate that it has an organizational structure, the facilities and significant institutional support that allow it to transcend the traditional boundaries of university and hospital departments, as well as an experienced center director. Finally, the institution must show that it is capable of translating laboratory findings to the clinic and enrolling significant numbers of patients on clinical trials to allow this to happen.
Once these baselines are met, the application undergoes a rigorous and extensive analysis by the nation's most accomplished cancer specialists and researchers. The criteria are exacting. In the U.S., there are thousands of research facilities, medical schools, and hospitals that provide patient care and participate in cancer research. But only 67 have met the NCI's requirements to be a designated cancer center.
The Two Types of NCI Designation:
Cancer Centers and Comprehensive Cancer Centers
An NCI Cancer Center has a collaborative, scientific agenda that is focused on laboratory, clinical research or population science, or a combination of these components. Cancer centers with clinical components must exhibit investigator-initiated clinical trials. There are 25 NCI-designated cancer centers in the United States. There are none in Nevada. The NCI-designated cancer center closest to Las Vegas is Sanford-Burnham in southern California, more than 320 miles away.
An NCI Comprehensive Cancer Center has demonstrated depth and breadth of research activities in all three major areas (laboratory, clinical and population-based research) with substantial collaborative, trans-disciplinary research. A comprehensive cancer center must also have wide-ranging, effective programs in community outreach and education, demonstrate significant professional education for physicians and other healthcare professionals, and disseminate clinical and public health advances within the community it serves.
There are 42 NCI-designated comprehensive cancer centers in the U.S. There are none in Nevada. The closest comprehensive cancer center to Las Vegas is City of Hope in southern California, more than 250 miles away.
Who Benefits from This Designation?
The comprehensive cancer center designation is significant for patients, the community, and the institution:
- Comprehensive cancer center patients benefit by receiving treatment from the world's most distinguished physicians performed at the most technologically advanced facilities, with therapeutic protocols that are continuously being informed by research advances and clinical trial data.
- Communities gain an extensive array of medical and public education programs, focused resources, pro-active outreach endeavors and high-touch navigation efforts that provide the latest information and services related to cancer prevention, screening, research, treatment and survivorship.
- Institutions garner an unsurpassed credential along with significant federal research support, as well as the support of other public and private agencies that award grant funding only to institutions with the NCI designation.
NVCI's Progress Toward Becoming a Comprehensive Cancer Center
NVCI is well positioned in its quest for NCI designation. The Institute is organized as a free-standing research institute affiliated with the universities that comprise the Nevada System of Higher Education, in particular, the University of Nevada, Reno, and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. From both a clinical and research point of view, it is organized around the diseases we call cancer rather than around traditional, academic university departments.
The community and its support of the institution have been outstanding, the facilities are in place, and the Institute has a highly experienced director.
Further, the clinical research enterprise is active and growing, and there is a strong scientific program organized around the discovery of new pathways and targets that are amenable to clinical attack.
NVCI's main need in obtaining NCI designation is to continue to grow its research programs. This is a process that will take the next several years to reach its maturity, but at that time all of the pieces will be in place.
