Scott Ramsey, M.D., Ph.D., an internist, health care economist and member of the Public Health Sciences Division, will lead a $4 million project to develop an infrastructure to support the "Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research in Cancer Genomics," or CANCERGEN.

"Dozens of genomic tests for cancer are coming to market without the high quality evidence that physicians and patients need to answer basic questions," said Ramsey, whose project will lay the foundation for designing research to study cancer genetic tests in collaboration with the Southwest Oncology Group, among others.

"Are patients living longer? Are they living better quality lives? Are there cost-effective alternatives to the way we currently treat patients? We just don't have those answers," he said.

Reducing the risk of infection and early death in patients who receive cord blood transplants to treat tumors of the blood, such as leukemia and lymphoma, is the goal of a $1.74 million grant to Colleen Delaney, M.D., an assistant member in the Clinical Research Division. Patients undergoing a cord blood transplant, who are often of minority or mixed ethnic background, are at increased risk of infection and early death following the transplant because of the significant delay in the recovery of white blood cells, particularly cells called neutrophils. Neutrophils are the most common type of white blood cell and are the body's first line of defense against infections. However, using a novel culture methodology, Delaney demonstrated for the first time the ability to generate increased numbers of cells from a single unit of cord blood that are capable of rapid neutrophil recovery when infused in the clinical setting.

"Further development of this product to confirm our initial promising results requires additional clinical trials that, if successful, could change the way cord blood transplantation is performed," Delaney said.

SOURCE Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center