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· Establishment of a first-rate treatment facility that allows most patients to receive cancer treatment as an outpatient. Compassionate and experienced nurses deliver expert care. · Establishment of a nationally recognized integrated program for treatment of and research in leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma. This program developed a major leukemia tissue bank, which is a national resource for laboratory researchers, and an immunoreference laboratory that receives samples from leukemia patients all over the country for testing for diagnosis and for minimal residual disease after treatment. This program offers treatment second to none for patients with hematologic malignancies. Accomplishments to date include the development of new treatments for Hodgkin’s disease and other lymphomas and for various leukemias, the elucidation of the role heredity plays in certain hematologic malignancies, and the demonstration that lymphomas occur with increased frequency in patients who have had breast cancer. This program has been partially supported by the National Cancer Institute and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. · We are a nationally recognized center of excellence in the treatment of kidney cancer. The physician staff of this program played a major role in the initial development of interleukin-2 therapy for kidney cancer, a treatment that, to date, has resulted in more long-term disease-free survivors of metastatic kidney cancer than any other treatment. Additional new treatment options are undergoing clinical investigation at our center. Recently, a kidney cancer tissue bank has been established to provide material for laboratory research, and laboratory research projects designed to learn how kidney cancer grows and spreads have recently been initiated. · Our molecular virology laboratory has found evidence of a virus that causes breast cancer in female mice and lymphoma in male mice in half of women who have had both malignancies. We are now working to determine exactly what role, if any, that virus plays in the development of human breast cancer and lymphoma. · This work has been partially supported by New York State. In another laboratory we are working to make an effective but toxic antileukemia drug more effective and less toxic by chemically wrapping the drug in fat droplets. This program has received funding from the FDA. · Finally, our three-year fellowship program in hematology and medical oncology has begun to graduate physicians who have obtained jobs in academia and private practice. All graduates have passed their board exams. Those are some of the accomplishments of the Center. Here are some of the problems: · After more than 5 years of over-capacity use of the outpatient and inpatient facilities of the Cancer Center, the physical plant is in need of repair and refurbishment. The entire facility needs to be redecorated, repainted, etc., and some inpatient rooms need major renovation with replacement of bathroom fixtures and the like. We estimate that this refurbishment will cost at least $150,000. · Our laboratory research building about a quarter of a mile north of the hospital is a solid building with beautiful, newly completely renovated laboratory research space. Our private offices are located on the same floor as our labs. The roof has begun to leak and its getting worse. According to several contractors, the roof needs to be replaced and cannot be repaired. The work needs to be done soon, or we will jeopardize many important laboratory experiments and banks of valuable tissues. The estimate for this project is $110,000. · We need to establish a patient care fund to help neighborhood patients afford what they need for adequate cancer patient care. Some of our local patients miss appointments because they can’t get a ride to the center and are too sick to come by bus. Some take only half their medicines because they cannot afford the full dose, etc. We need to establish a small fund, administered by our social workers, that could be used to eliminate problems such as these for our neediest patients. We estimate a need of approximately $20,000 annually for this effort. · We need to establish a fund of approximately $250,000 to support our growing laboratory research program. Prospects for additional research funding from traditional sources such as various federal government agencies (NIH, FDA) look rather bleak for the next few years. Most such grants require matching funds from the institution, so even if we are successful in winning more federal grants, we will have to match some of those funds with monies we do not currently have. I ask that you consider making the Comprehensive Cancer Center at Our Lady of Mercy Medical Center a charitable interest of yours. All donations are fully tax deductible, and 100% of all donated funds will be directly applied to the needs of the Center and its patients. Please help us help you. If you wish, you may designate one of the above programs as a recipient of your donation. Please make all donations payable to the Comprehensive Cancer Center, OLM and mail them to:
Peter H. Wiernik, MD
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