Learn all about Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. As one of the world’s premier cancer centers, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center is committed to exceptional patient care, leading-edge research, and superb educational programs.
MSKCC physicians are currently leading more than 550 clinical trials for pediatric and adult cancers. The Center has been a leader in understanding the disease and developing new ways to diagnose and treat cancer. It has also made progress in understanding the biology of cancer through research programs in cancer biology and genetics, cell biology, computational biology, developmental biology, immunology, molecular biology, molecular pharmacology and chemistry, and structural biology.
MSKCC has initiated a series of training programs to prepare the next generation of physicians, scientists, and other health care professionals for leadership roles in the life sciences and medicine. MSKCC is on the way of treating almost 400 subtypes of cancer.
At the same time, MSKCC offers a full range of programs to help patients and families throughout all phases of treatment, including support groups, genetic counseling, help in managing pain and symptoms, rehabilitation, integrative medical services, and assistance in navigating life after treatment
Since the “War on Cancer” was declared in 1971, the United States alone has expended some $300 billion on research, with a heavy focus on the role of genomics in anticancer therapy. Voluminous data have been collected and analyzed. However, in hindsight, any achievements made have not been realized in clinical practice in terms of overall survival or quality of life extended. This might be justified because cancer is not one disease but a conglomeration of multiple diseases, with widespread heterogeneity even within a single tumor type.
”Imaging a World without Cancer” is clearly a vision. For its realization, a global personalized and individualized anticancer strategy could be fundamental as both could integrate patient- and tumor-associated achievements in research in an adoptable and cost sensitive manner. Cancer stands for a malignant tumor, one that is characterized by anaplasia (i.e., the loss of normal appearance of cells) and autonomy (loss of inhibition of growth) displaying invasive and tissue-destroying properties.
Imagine a world without cancer
The War on Cancer was declared by President Nixon in1971 when he signed the National Cancer Act, with the primary aim of strengthening the National Cancer Institute (NCI). Since then, the US alone has expended billions on huge data collection and analyses, understanding genomic techniques, and on anticancer treatments.
Imaging a World without Cancer is clearly a goal of all cancer patients, experts and organizations, and this requires a focused anticancer strategy that culminates in a personalized treatment strategy based on a new cancer classification scheme combined with an assessment of the individualized patient response for therapy modification. Although often used in the singular, cancer is not one disease, but rather a collection of more than 100 diseases with some traits in common.
The change in cancer incidences as well as the achievements have been pointed out recently within the Blueprint of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO): “Two out of three people live at least five years after cancer diagnosis, up from roughly one out of two in the 1970s” and “The nation’s cancer death rate has dropped 18 percent since the early 1990s, reversing decades of increases”.
Allthough cancer survival rates have improved over the past several decades. This can be attributed to larger gains in some cancers including breast, colon, and Hodgkin’s lymphoma, while improvements in survival may (at best) be of barely a few weeks for cancers of the lung, brain, or pancreas.
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK or MSKCC) is a cancer treatment and research institution in New York City, founded in 1884 as the New York Cancer Hospital. Its main campus is located at 1275 York Avenue, between 67th and 68th Streets, in Manhattan. In 1980 Memorial Hospital and the Sloan-Kettering Institute formally merged into a singular entity under the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center name.
The new Evelyn H. Lauder Breast Center of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center Imaging Center have opened, offering patients the most advanced outpatient services for cancer diagnosis and breast cancer treatment and detection.
MSKCC’s experts have established standards of care and treatment protocols for each type and stage of cancer. A high degree of specialization means the Center’s physicians treat more than 400 different subtypes of cancer.
Fred’s Team
Fred’s Team was named in honor of running legend and co-founder of the New York City Marathon, Fred Lebow a man who dreamed of a world without cancer. In 1991, while being treated at Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK) for brain cancer, Fred jogged down the hospital hallways, determined to run to raise money for a cure. He encouraged runners competing in that year’s New York City Marathon to solicit donations for each mile, and he designated MSK as the first official charity.
Fred’s Team participants support more than 50 areas of cancer research, many of them rare, including: Since 1997, Fred’s Team has been the primary source of support for the Aubrey Fund, an initiative that drives research about childhood cancers, such as leukemia, neuroblastoma, brain tumors, and certain types of sarcoma.
