Siteman Cancer Center

Workers unwrap the world’s first superconducting synchrocyclotron proton accelerator at the Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The device is part of a proton therapy system being installed at Washington University Medical Center at the Kling Center for Proton Therapy,

Cancer can be deadly, but it actually kills higher percentages of African-American men and women than other racial and ethnic groups. So researchers at Washington University School of Medicine and the Siteman Cancer Center in St. Louis are trying to learn why those disparities exist and what to do about them.

A newly established fund to support innovative cancer research at the Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center has awarded its first two $900,000 grants to high-tech efforts to undermine cancer cells’ ability to resist treatment. The awards will help scientists use genetic data to find new ways to attack treatment-resistant breast cancer and precisely target treatments for various kinds of cancer cells based on their responses to radiation therapy.

Innovative, high-priority research initiatives by Washington University scientists at the Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center are now under way thanks to a $7.5 million grant from Emerson and AT&T. Emerson’s Charitable Trust and the AT&T Foundation are contributing $5 million and $2.5 million, respectively. This commitment will generate an additional $15 million for these initiatives through matching support from Washington University School of Medicine, BJC HealthCare and the Siteman Cancer Center.

In a study of heavy smokers, fewer screened with low-dose CT scans died, compared with similar smokers screened with standard chest X-rays. The National Cancer Institute ran the 33-center National Lung Screening Trial to learn whether more sensitive screening could have an impact on lung-cancer deaths, and Washington University researchers involved in the study say it did.

The Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine has received renewal of its designation as a Comprehensive Cancer Center by the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

When Graham Colditz, MD, DrPH, went to medical school, he was struck by the kinds of patients he saw in the hospital. Too many were suffering from heart attacks or lung cancer — conditions linked to smoking. “It made me wonder: Couldn’t we do a better job at prevention?” he says.

A new $4.27 million, five-year grant from the National Cancer Institute will enable Washington University School of Medicine researchers at the Siteman Cancer Center’s Program for the Elimination of Cancer Disparities (PECaD) to extend its work to eliminate racial and economic gaps in cancer care.

Washington University’s American Cancer Society Institutional Research Grant program is accepting applications through Oct. 22.

Washington University School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital plan to build a new Siteman Cancer Center in south St. Louis County, serving the Interstate 55 corridor and southern Illinois.