Researchers at City of Hope are creating tomorrow’s therapies for the patients who need them today. Here’s how they do it.
City of Hope has been delivering outstanding compassionate care for more than a century, combining treatments at the leading edge of science for advanced cancer patients with a model that cares for the whole patient and their family — emotionally as well as physically.
This unique patient experience has earned City of Hope numerous accolades, including designation as a National Cancer Institute comprehensive cancer center, an honor earned by just 4% of U.S. cancer centers. City of Hope also has Magnet® recognition from the American Nurses Credentialing Center, a recognition earned by only 9% of U.S. hospitals.
But surrounding an expansive core of world-renowned physicians is a robust research and development enterprise — an institution-spanning system that is tailor-made to accelerate innovations from the lab to patients.
INNOVATION
City of Hope’s groundbreaking translational research history includes developing the technology underlying synthetic human insulin — a breakthrough in diabetes management — and monoclonal antibodies, which are integral to widely used, lifesaving cancer drugs, such as trastuzumab, rituximab and cetuximab.
City of Hope is also a national leader in cancer immunotherapeutics and tumor immunology research, with an infrastructure unmatched by any other biomedical institution in the U.S.
Immunotherapy is more than just a narrow field of study at City of Hope — it is the central component of groundbreaking research and clinical trials currently underway.
City of Hope stands at the forefront of a powerful form of immunotherapy known as chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy. Using this approach, immune cells are taken from a patient’s bloodstream, reprogrammed to recognize and attack a specific protein found in cancer cells, then reintroduced into the patient’s system, where they destroy tumor cells.
City of Hope’s history with CAR T cell therapy dates to the late 1990s and builds on the pioneering work of Stephen J. Forman, M.D., in
bone marrow transplantation (BMT). The City of Hope’s BMT program began in 1976 and has since grown into one of the largest, most successful programs of its kind in the U.S.
Currently, City of Hope is investigating CAR T cell therapy as a bridge to bone marrow transplant for leukemia and lymphoma patients and is unique in its research of CAR T in combination with transplant. Among the diseases that City of Hope physicians and scientists are targeting with CAR T cell therapy are lymphoma, leukemia, multiple myeloma, glioblastoma and other brain tumors, and prostate and breast cancer.
INFRASTRUCTURE
Having necessary infrastructure in place is critical to driving innovation. Three on-site good manufacturing practice facilities can produce any of the therapies that scientists can envision for use in clinical trials. And more than 20 core labs offer additional expertise and equipment that are essential to this translational continuum, from gene editing to structural biology to analytical pharmacology. With these capabilities close at hand, investigators are better equipped to advance their ideas with speed.
Beyond the traditional research capabilities, City of Hope scientists additionally benefit from expertise rarely seen in an academic setting: experienced drug development experts who work hand-in-hand with researchers, along with a regulatory affairs team that helps navigate the regulatory process.
ACCELERATION
In the City of Hope model, researchers whose projects are evaluated may be offered the option to funnel their science into a drug development program designed to shorten the time between discoveries in the lab to the time when they can begin first-in-human clinical trials.
This approach to research and development can mean that an innovative discovery might be spun out into a startup company or licensed to an existing biopharmaceutical company. The ultimate goal is speeding new discoveries to patients by fast-tracking potentially life-changing new therapies.
INTENTION
Finally, there is an intangible that breathes life into these efforts: an unwavering institutional commitment to turn science into practical benefit. City of Hope faculty, staff and supporters embrace that mission because they see moving research rapidly to help patients as an integral component of compassionate care. Across the institution, researchers are focused on developing drugs that receive Food and Drug Administration approval and reach the market to improve patients’ lives. In this way, City of Hope’s entrepreneurial spirit is an outgrowth of its humanitarian roots, which date back more than a century.
When it comes to cancer, patients need solutions today. With time of the essence, City of Hope’s engine of innovation hastens effective treatments and cures, transforming the future of cancer care.
For more information about City of Hope, visit CityofHope.org, or call 626-256-HOPE (4673).
