FEDERAL CANCER PROGRAM RENAMES BEAUMONT TO ELITE RESEARCH GROUP

The National Cancer Institute has renewed Beaumont Hospitals’ cancer program’s designation as a Community Clinical Oncology Program for five more years, and awarded it a $4.8 million research grant. 

Beaumont became a Community Clinical Oncology Program in 2002 and is one of only 47 CCOPs in the country designated by the National Cancer Institute to provide patients with access to leading-edge cancer clinical research trials.

The grant money will support Beaumont’s ongoing efforts to provide opportunities for adults and children to participate in NCI-sponsored clinical research trials.  Such trials focus on cancer prevention or treatment and translational research.

“Five-year extensions and an increase in the grant award are very unusual,” says Frank Vicini, M.D., corporate director of Oncology Services. “The award is a reflection of outstanding collaborative efforts by our physicians, principal investigators, the Beaumont Research Institute, Cancer Clinical Trials Office and the Beaumont Oncology Network.”

The federal government created the Community Clinical Oncology Program in 1983 to use highly trained cancer doctors in community settings to bring the benefits of research to a greater number of people.  Benefits include increasing quality of care by making the latest research findings available, and enhancing the value of research by adding to the number and diversity of participants in clinical trials.

"It's important for Beaumont to continue to offer CCOP programs to the community," says Gary Chmielewski, M.D.,thoracic surgeon and principal investigator for Beaumont’s CCOP. "With the CCOP, we can offer a variety of treatment studies and the latest research findings related to the care of cancer patients. This fits in with our overriding goal of getting research out of the lab and to the bedside.”

Beaumont’s comprehensive cancer program combines the expertise of Beaumont Hospitals with the knowledge and experience of physicians in the Beaumont Oncology Network, the largest group of oncology specialists in the state, to offer cancer prevention counseling, diagnosis and treatment in hospital and community-based settings. Beaumont is designated as a Blue Cross Center of Distinction for the Treatment of Rare and Complex Cancers.

Beaumont’s Cancer Clinical Trials Office can be reached by calling 248-551-7695.  Information about clinical trials at Beaumont is also available on its Web site, www.beaumonthospitals.com/cancer. 

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