Yale Cancer Center (YCC) was founded in 1974 as a result of an act of

Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of a ...

in 1971, which declared the nation's "war on

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

". It is one of a network of 51 Comprehensive Cancer Centers designated by the

National Cancer Institute The National Cancer Institute (NCI) coordinates the United States National Cancer Program and is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is one of eleven agencies that are part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. ...

(NCI).Currently directed by Dr. Eric Winer, the Cancer Center brings together the resources of the

Yale School of Medicine The Yale School of Medicine is the graduate medical school at Yale University, a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. It was founded in 1810 as the Medical Institution of Yale College and formally opened in 1813. The primary te ...

(YSM),

Yale New Haven Hospital Yale New Haven Hospital (YNHH) is a 1,541-bed hospital located in New Haven, Connecticut. It is owned and operated by the Yale New Haven Health System. YNHH includes the 168-bed Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale New Haven, the 201-bed Yale New Haven ...

(YNHH), and the

Yale School of Public Health The Yale School of Public Health (YSPH) was founded in 1915 by Charles-Edward Amory Winslow and is one of the oldest public health masters programs in the United States. It is consistently rated among the best schools of public health in the co ...

(YSPH).

Overview and history

In 1942,

Louis S. Goodman Louis Sanford Goodman (August 27, 1906 – November 19, 2000) was an American pharmacologist. He is best known for his collaborations with Alfred Gilman, Sr., with whom he authored the popular textbook ''The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutic ...

, M.D., and Alfred Gilman, Ph.D., in the

Yale Department of Pharmacology Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

were the first scientists to use

nitrogen mustard Nitrogen mustards are cytotoxic organic compounds with the chloroethylamine (Cl(CH2)2NR2) functional group. Although originally produced as chemical warfare agents, they were the first chemotherapeutic agents for treatment of cancer. Nitrogen m ...

, the first alkylating anticancer agent, as

chemotherapy Chemotherapy (often abbreviated to chemo and sometimes CTX or CTx) is a type of cancer treatment that uses one or more anti-cancer drugs (chemotherapeutic agents or alkylating agents) as part of a standardized chemotherapy regimen. Chemotherap ...

to treat cancer in a patient. During a talk for the

Beaumont Medical Club Beaumont may refer to: Places Canada * Beaumont, Alberta * Beaumont, Quebec England * Beaumont, Cumbria * Beaumont, Essex **Beaumont Cut, a canal closed in the 1930s * Beaumont Street, Oxford France (communes) * Beaumont, Ardèche * Be ...

in March 2005, David S. Fischer, M.D. clinical professor of medicine, said, "This was the first patient in the world treated by chemotherapy ... This was proof that cancer could be treated by chemicals." This initial success led to the development of the world's first multi-center clinical trials in cancer chemotherapy.

Clinical care

Clinical care is led by Roy S. Herbst, Chief of Medical Oncology and Associate Director for Translational Research, Yale medical oncologists care for patients in Smilow Cancer Hospital. To organize patient care, Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital have developed 13 multidisciplinary programs to provide physicians and specialists at Yale Cancer Center with the opportunity to focus their expertise on specific types of cancers.

Research

Yale School of Medicine was home to the country’s first university-based Medical Oncology Section, and its faculty has since pioneered many breakthrough cancer treatments. Basic research in cancer is a hallmark of Yale Cancer Center, which draws approximately $96 million in cancer research funding to Yale every year. The research portfolio of Yale Cancer Center comprises six research programs: * Cancer Immunology * Cancer Prevention and Control * Cancer Signaling Networks * Developmental Therapeutics * Genetics, Genomics, and Epigenetics * Radiobiology and Radiotherapy

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Yale Cancer Center Cancer organizations based in the United States 1974 establishments in Connecticut Medical research institutes in the United States Yale University buildings Yale School of Medicine NCI-designated cancer centers Research institutes in Connecticut