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Children's cancer research jewel to rise in San Antonio
(8-02-01)
With the swish of a small shovel, a child fittingly moved the first
earth Thursday for the Children's Cancer Research Center (CCRC), a resource
to serve South Texas, the state and the nation.
The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio will operate
the regional facility, which will focus on basic mechanisms of childhood
cancer and will include development of new therapies for its many forms.
"The Children's Cancer Research Center is important because children
suffer from different types of cancers than adults, and they require different
treatments," said Francisco G. Cigarroa, M.D., president of the Health
Science Center. As a pediatric and transplant surgeon, he has helped many
children with cancer. He said the center will unravel the mystery of cancer
piece by piece, bringing hope for better methods of prevention, more effective
treatments and, someday, a cure.
Speakers for the important occasion included the state's former attorney
general, The Honorable Dan Morales, who on March 28, 1996, filed suit
against the tobacco industry on behalf of the state's residents. The suit
led to a $1.5 billion settlement to be paid over 25 years and to be appropriated
by the Legislature for the good of Texans.
Morales later called the Health Science Center to ask for a proposal that
would use some of the money wisely - and faculty including Celia I. Kaye,
M.D., Ph.D., vice dean of the UTHSC Medical School and professor and chair
of pediatrics, conceived the Children's Cancer Research Center.
The CCRC is supported by a $200 million endowment, the nation's single
largest cancer endowment. The 76th Texas Legislature awarded the funding
to the Health Science Center in 1999 for the purpose of creating a new
comprehensive research facility to serve the state.
"We break ground today on an absolutely state-of-the-art facility
that will help us attract outstanding children's cancer research scientists
to San Antonio," said Anthony J. Infante, M.D., Ph.D., interim director
of the CCRC, associate dean for research in the Medical School, and professor
of pediatrics and microbiology. "I see CCRC scientists making important
discoveries about children's cancer in the areas of epidemiology, genetics,
molecular mechanisms, tumor imaging, and the development of new and better
drugs, vaccines and radiation therapies."
The CCRC will be at the Health Science Center's North Campus, 8403 Floyd
Curl Drive in the South Texas Medical Center. The four-story, $49.5 million
structure will provide 100,000 square feet of needed research space. San
Antonio already is home to burgeoning research initiatives geared to serving
children, including clinical trials of new cancer-fighting medications
and efforts to speed the drug-development process.
Synergistically, the CCRC will be located next to the newest building
of the Cancer Therapy & Research Center. The Health Science Center
and the Cancer Therapy & Research Center are partners in the San Antonio
Cancer Institute, one of only two Comprehensive Cancer Centers in Texas
and 38 nationwide as designated by the National Cancer Institute.
Garza/Bomberger & Associates of San Antonio assembled the CCRC design/build
team, which includes the San Francisco firm NBBJ, designer of prominent
research buildings such as the Rainbow Babies' and Children's Hospital
in Cleveland, Ohio. Bartlett Cocke, L.P., of San Antonio is the general
contractor.
Contact: Will Sansom or Aileen Salinas