The Cancer Program of Our Lady of the Lake and Mary Bird Perkins Selected for Prestigious National Cancer Institute Pilot Program
06/14/2007
Helping to bring advanced cancer care to more
Americans in the communities where they live
The Cancer Program of Our Lady of the Lake and Mary Bird Perkins was named
today by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of
Health, as a participant in its Community Cancer Centers Program (NCCCP) pilot
to help expand cancer research and further deliver state-of-the-art cancer care
to patients in the Baton Rouge community and across the United States.
The Cancer Program of Our Lady of the Lake and Mary Bird Perkins is one of
only 14 sites in the country and the only site in the Gulf South named to
participate in the innovative three-year pilot. The Cancer Program was selected
based on its ability and experience in conducting clinical trials and providing
leadership and healthcare outreach in the communities it serves. The pilot will
focus on bringing more Americans into a system of high-quality cancer care,
increasing participation in clinical trials and reducing cancer healthcare
disparities. A successful pilot will lead to the nationwide launch of the NCCCP
in 2010.
The pilot program will extend the reach of the NCI into more U.S. cities and
towns, as estimates show that 85 percent of cancer patients in the U.S. are
diagnosed at community cancer centers. The other 15 percent are diagnosed at
NCI-designated Cancer Centers, a network of 63 academic research institutions
located in largely urban areas across the country. Many patients are not treated
at the major cancer centers because of the distance from their homes, or for
other personal or economic reasons. The NCCCP pilot will extend NCI programs
into local communities, giving patients easier access to clinical research and
advanced care.
The pilot will research new and enhanced ways to better meet the needs of
underserved populations—including elderly, rural, inner-city and low-income
patients—and encourages the collaboration of private-practice medical, surgical
and radiation oncologists and a network of the 63 NCI-designated Cancer Centers.
The pilot includes giving patients access to the very latest cancer prevention
and treatment advances through NCI-sponsored clinical trials. Evidence from a
wide range of studies suggests that cancer patients diagnosed and treated in
such a setting of multi-specialty care and clinical research may live longer and
have a better quality of life.
“Participation in the NCI pilot will accelerate our Cancer Program’s efforts
to develop interdisciplinary evidenced-based approaches in a community setting -
bringing the process to the benefit of all patients. We look forward to sharing
best practices and collaborating nationally with other top community cancer
programs, knowing that our work for the next three years will result in improved
access to quality cancer care across the nation,” said Todd Stevens, president
and CEO, Mary Bird Perkins.
“Our Lady of the Lake and Mary Bird Perkins have a long-standing tradition of
providing the very best in cancer care to the Baton Rouge community. This
prestigious selection validates the high quality of our care and the excellence
of our physicians. It also means we are on the frontlines of setting the
standards for care excellence benefiting thousands of cancer patients across our
nation,” said Robert Davidge, CEO, OLOL.
The Cancer Program of Our Lady of the Lake and Mary Bird Perkins, along with
the following sites, will be funded for a collective total of $5 million per
year.
The other hospitals and their cancer centers selected for the NCI Cancer
Pilot are:
- Billings Clinic, Billings, Mont. (Billings Clinic
Cancer Center)
- Hartford Hospital, Hartford, Conn. (Helen & Harry
Gray Cancer Center)
- St. Joseph’s / Candler, Savannah, Ga. (Nancy N. and
J.C. Lewis Cancer & Research Pavilion)
- Sanford USD Medical Center, Sioux Falls, S.D.
(Sanford Cancer Center)
- Spartanburg Regional Hospital, Spartanburg, S.C.,
(Gibbs Regional Cancer Center)
- St. Joseph Hospital, Orange, Calif. (St. Joseph
Hospital Cancer Center
- Christiana Hospital, Newark, Del. (Helen F. Graham
Cancer Center at Christiana Care)
- Ascension Health of St. Louis, Mo. for these
hospitals:
- St. Vincent Indianapolis Hospital, Indianapolis,
Ind. (St. Vincent Oncology Center)
- Columbia St. Mary’s, Milwaukee, Wis. (Columbia St.
Mary’s Cancer Center)
- Brackenridge Hospital, Austin, Texas (Shivers Center)
- Catholic Health Initiatives of Denver, Colo., for
these hospitals:
- Penrose-St. Francis Health Services, Colorado
Springs, Colo. (Penrose Cancer Center)
- St. Joseph Medical Center, Towson , Md. (St. Joseph
Cancer Institute)
- A coordinated regional program in Nebraska sponsored by Good Samaritan
Hospital in Kearney (Good Samaritan Cancer Center); St. Elizabeth Regional
Medical Center in Lincoln (St. Elizabeth Cancer Center); and St. Francis
Medical Center in Grand Island (St. Francis Cancer Treatment Center).
Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center in Baton Rouge is the largest
private medical center in Louisiana. The hospital occupies 100 acres in the
heart of Baton Rouge, including the cancer center. The Cancer Program includes
Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center, a nonprofit, comprehensive radiation therapy
facility, which joined with Our Lady of the Lake in 1988 to offer
multi-specialty cancer care. The Cancer Program provides nearly 42,000 cancer
treatments and serves 2,258 new cancer cases each year.
The Cancer Program of Our Lady of the Lake
and Mary Bird Perkins is the most comprehensive cancer program in the region
offering patients the convenience of receiving high-quality, advanced cancer
care in one location, close to home. The Cancer Program offers surgery,
chemotherapy and radiation and has been accredited by the American College of
Surgeons since 1992 – the gold-standard for community-based cancer care. For
more information on our Cancer Program and the NCCCP pilot, please visit www.ololrmc.com
or www.marybird.org.
For more information about the NCI Community Cancer Centers Program, please
visit the home page at http://ncccp.cancer.gov. For more information about cancer,
please visit the NCI Web site at http://www.cancer.gov, or call NCI's Cancer Information
Service at 1-800-4-CANCER (1-800-422-6237).
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