Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center’s Comprehensive Cancer Center has had its designation by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) as a comprehensive cancer center renewed for five years.
The Wake Forest Baptist center is one of just three NCI-designated comprehensive cancer centers in North Carolina and one of 46 in the country. It has held this distinction continuously since 1990, one of the few to do so.
The NCI, which is part of the National Institutes of Health, confers the comprehensive cancer center designation in recognition of innovative care, scientific leadership and depth and breadth of research in basic, clinical and population science. The NCI designation includes grants that support shared research, foster transdisciplinary programs and provide developmental funds to advance scientific goals.
“We are very pleased that the National Cancer Institute has seen fit to renew our designation as a comprehensive cancer center,” said Boris Pasche, M.D., Ph.D., director, Wake Forest Baptist’s Comprehensive Cancer Center. “It is a tribute to our determined efforts to improve the lives of cancer patients through prevention, early diagnosis and novel treatment, along with recognizing the specialized training that we provide for scientists, physicians and other professionals to advance cancer research and care.”
A 2015 clinical study in the medical journal Cancer followed 69,579 individuals aged 22 to 65 with newly diagnosed cancer who lived in Los Angeles County. The researchers found that those who were treated at National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Centers (NCICCCs) experienced superior survival compared with those treated at non-NCI-designated facilities.
In its renewal, NCI reviewers rated Wake Forest Baptist’s Comprehensive Cancer Center’s clinical and research facilities as exceptional, the highest possible national rating that can be achieved.
Media Relations
Mac Ingraham: mingraha@wakehealth.edu, 336-716-3487
Joe McCloskey: jmcclosk@wakehealth.edu, 336-716-1273