UM’s Sylvester cancer center just got a national seal of approval. What does it mean for patients?

Cancer patients in South Florida no longer have to travel hundreds of miles to access novel treatments, drugs and government-funded research for their illnesses.

On Monday, the University of Miami Health System’s Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center became the second facility in Florida, and the 71st in the United States, to be designated by the National Cancer Institute, which is part of the National Institutes of Health.

The designation will bring new resources and research, much of it funded by the federal government, to Miami where patients can more easily access innovative care.

For decades, Florida — the third most populated state — has had only one cancer center boasting an NCI designation. Miami is home to the state’s second.

UM President Dr. Julio Frenk and Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center Director Dr. Stephen Nimer announced the designation during a press conference Monday morning at the UM Miller School of Medicine campus.

“The best has yet to come,” Nimer said during the event.

The NCI Cancer Centers Program was created under the National Cancer Act of 1971 to promote cancer research and support high-performing cancer centers. By designating a cancer center, the NCI recognizes the center’s focus on clinical research and science as among the best in the U.S.

Nimer said the designation gives South Florida patients more than a center with a fancy title; it makes Sylvester eligible to access cancer treatments, drugs and grants that are only available to NCI-designated centers. Sylvester can combine strong research and funding to personally care for individual patients, he said, and the designation will also help UHealth attract graduate students, researchers and specialists.

“It’s also a reflection of us being on the cutting edge,” Nimer told the Miami Herald in an interview last week.

Speakers at the announcement included U.S. Sen. Rick Scott; U.S. Rep. Donna Shalala, who is a former UM president; UHealth CEO Dr. Edward Abraham; Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences at NCI Director Robert Croyle; and UM Miller School of Medicine Dean Dr. Henri Ford.

“What a great day for South Florida, and what a great day for the country,” Shalala said. “You don’t get here without having great leaders and I want to acknowledge Stephen Nimer, who took a chance on us, and from day one he knew that his goal was to build on a very solid base — a world class cancer center — so that we could get this designation.”

Before the designation, Nimer said Sylvester developed a cancer epigenetics research program and launched a community outreach program that does work like cervical cancer prevention in Little Haiti.

The goal for designated cancer centers is to bring new treatments and lab discoveries into hospital rooms and clinics. Sylvester’s patients can benefit from clinical trials that weren’t previously available in the region, said Erin Kobetz, a Sylvester associate director.

Sylvester focuses heavily on community outreach in Miami’s diverse communities to make sure cancer research represents minority communities, Kobetz said. As minority populations continue to grow throughout the United States, research done in Miami can help researchers and physicians access accurate data and close gaps in cancer education.

“That will accelerate patient care and ensure that there is translation of novel discoveries to the community for maximum impact,” Kobetz said.

The Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa had been Florida’s sole NCI-designated cancer center since 1998. South Florida patients in need of chemotherapy and surgery no longer have to drive hundreds of miles to seek treatment from a federally recognized center, Nimer said.

Brian Springer, the Moffitt associate center director of research administration, told the Miami Herald he congratulates his colleagues at Sylvester for the achievement. Moffitt, Sylvester and the UF Health Cancer Center collaborate to research pancreatic cancer, one of the deadliest forms of the disease.

Every NCI-designated center must reapply every five years, which is as daunting as submitting for the application, Springer said. Since receiving its designation, Springer said Moffitt developed research in immunotherapy, which “teaches the immune system to fight cancer.”

“Designation is the first step,” he said. “Then you focus on the work that you’re doing to bring about an end to cancer.”

Nimer left New York’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, an NCI-designated institution, seven years ago to join Sylvester as director. He said bringing the designation to Miami was his first major goal.

The designation was more than six years in the making, Nimer said. A team at Sylvester worked weekends and long nights to write a 1,300-page single-spaced application and practice 12 seven-hour dress rehearsals before NCI representatives visited the center.

Nimer was hosting a dinner party in June when he got an email from NCI congratulating him. He displayed the email up on the TV screen and had his dinner guests swear to keep the secret. The accomplishment has been one of the best moments of his life, he said.

“That’s why I came here,” Nimer said. “So that we can do research that changes not just how people are treated here but how they are treated across the globe.”

This story was originally published July 29, 2019 at 2:45 PM.