LSU Health, LCMC Health, Louisiana Cancer Research Center and Tulane University, all based in New Orleans, are collaborating to bring the state's first National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center, but recruitment efforts stand in the way, nola.com reported Dec. 4.
Joe Ramos, PhD, director of the LSU Health-LCMC Health Cancer Center and the Louisiana Cancer Research Center, said the systems aim to apply for NCI designation in five years. Currently, they are recruiting researchers and applying for developmental funding from the National Institutes of Health, which "is a two-year process."
"Katrina knocked us sideways," Dr. Ramos told nola.com. "We lost a lot of researchers across Tulane and LSU and it set everything back. After the recovery, it took a while for researchers to start returning and rebuilding the research base. … Once we get new researchers here they have to collaborate and we need to make sure their research takes off here and gets applied to clinical trials and gets out into the community."
Currently LSU has 34 researchers and Tulane has 30, he said.
LSU Health and LCMC Health have each committed $50 million to the LSU Health-LCMC Health Cancer Center to expand cancer-focused research and care programs.