From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) is part of
the United
States Federal government's National Institutes of
Health. The NCI is a federally funded research and development
center, one of eight agencies that compose the Public Health
Service in the United
States Department of Health and Human Services. As of September
2006, the current director of the NCI is Dr. John E.
Niederhuber. The NCI coordinates the National Cancer
Program.
The National Cancer Institute has large intramural research
programs in Bethesda, Maryland and NCI-Frederick at Fort Detrick, in Frederick,
Maryland. In addition, the NCI funds cancer researchers around
the United States.
Legislative
history
Congress established the NCI by the
National Cancer Institute Act, August 5, 1937, as
an independent research institute. Congress then made the NCI an
operating division of the National Institutes of Health by the Public Health Service Act,
July 1, 1944. Congress amended the Public Health Service Act
with the National
Cancer Act of 1971 to broaden the scope and responsibilities of
the NCI "in order more effectively to carry out the national effort
against cancer." Over the years, legislative amendments have
maintained the NCI authorities and responsibilities and added new
information dissemination mandates as well as a requirement to
assess the incorporation of state-of-the-art cancer treatments into
clinical practice.
Anti-cancer drug
investigations
The NCI played an early role in
the development of anti-cancer drugs in the U.S. According to
a 1996 NCI analysis of drugs approved by the FDA,
two-thirds of the anti-cancer drugs approved as of the end of 1995
were NCI-sponsored Investigational New Drugs:
In addition, scientists in the NCI played an important role in
the discovery and development of important AIDS drugs including zidovudine (AZT), didanosine (ddI), and zalcitabine (ddC).
Quality
assurance
The NCI provides funding for numerous cancer research endeavors.
Two of its largest known grants include the Radiological Physics Center
(RPC) in Houston, Texas and the Quality Assurance Review
Center (QARC) in Providence, Rhode Island. The
RPC assures the NCI of proper participation in the physics-related
aspects of its studies and QARC provides radiotherapy quality
assurance and diagnostic
imaging data management to all of the NCI sponsored cooperative
groups. The RPC essentially guides all participating institutions
as to how radiation is to be applied in a radiotherapy protocol.
QARC on the other hand performs thousands of radiotherapy reviews
per year and receives radiotherapy data from around 1,000 hospitals
in both the United
States and abroad. In all, over 30,000 cases have been reviewed
at QARC since its inception in 1977. QARC also maintains a strategic affiliation
with the University of
Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, Massachusetts. The
RPC has been consistently funded by the NCI since 1968, and QARC has received support from the NCI
since 1980.
See also
External
links
References
- "NCI MISSION STATEMENT." National Cancer Institute. [1]. Retrieved 18
August 2004.
- "THE NATIONAL CANCER ACT OF 1971." National Cancer Institute.
[2]. Retrieved 18
August 2004.
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