Institute and Individual Awards
The below list highlights just some of the awards recently earned by Dana-Farber and its staff.
The Institute
July 2008 through September 2008
Dana-Farber has been given the highest ranking of any New England cancer hospital and the fifth-highest rating in the nation by U.S.News & World Report. The rankings, part of the magazine's annual "America's Best Hospitals" guide, were published in the July 14, 2008, issue.
Dana-Farber has been recognized by CIO magazine as a 2008 CIO 100 Award winner. The designation is given annually to 100 organizations around the world that exemplify the highest level of operational and strategic excellence in information technology. Dana-Farber was noted for its electronic data capture system, which collects clinical trials research data and generates reports for analysis — allowing for greater accuracy and immediate access to the data.
The new "Welcome to Dana-Farber" employee orientation video was honored with a 2008 Bronze Telly Award. Winners were chosen among 14,000 entrants from around the world. Telly Awards are considered a premier distinction for outstanding local, regional, and cable TV commercials and programs, as well as the finest video and film productions.
Individuals
July 2008 through September 2008
Dana-Farber scientists Levi Garraway, MD, PhD; Todd Golub, MD; William Hahn, MD, PhD; and Philip Kantoff, MD, are among the lead investigators in projects receiving Challenge Awards from the Prostate Cancer Foundation this year. The awards, which amount to more than $19 million in new research funding, invest in large, multiyear projects with high potential for solving problems associated with advanced prostate cancer.
Eric Winer, MD, chair of the Division of Women's Cancers and director of the Breast Oncology Center, has been promoted to professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. Since joining the Institute in 1997, he has helped improve the lives of women with breast cancer by understanding the individualization of the disease process and developing more effective and less toxic treatments.
Winer also recently won two awards. The Susan G. Komen for the Cure Greater New York City Chapter honored Winer with the first-ever Hally Yaccino Steiner Memorial Award. It is named after a patient of Winer's who died from the disease in 2006, and recognizes his research, service, and commitment to women with triple negative breast cancer. The Triple Negative Breast Cancer Foundation presented Winer with its first-time Advocacy Award. It was given for his work both as a board advisor to the foundation and for his dedication to research of triple negative breast cancer.
Harold Burstein, MD, PhD, of Medical Oncology, has been named the new editor-in-chief of The Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (JNCCN). The peer-reviewed publication provides updated information about clinical practices, oncology results, and the newest research initiatives. The breast cancer oncologist will lead its direction while also serving as the ambassador for JNCCN in the oncology community.
Molecular biologist Carl Novina, MD, PhD, was honored with a 2008 Distinguished Young Scholars in Medical Research Award from the W.M. Keck Foundation, a California-based philanthropic organization supporting groundbreaking biomedical research. Novina was among 10 scientists chosen to receive a five-year award of up to $1 million for his research on microRNAs.
Pasi Jänne, MD, PhD; Kornelia Polyak, MD, PhD; and Kwok-Kin Wong, MD, PhD, of Medical Oncology, were among 61 new medical faculty members across the country selected for membership in the American Society of Clinical Investigation (ASCI). The highly competitive honor society selects members who are physician-scientists in the upper ranks of academic medicine and who translate laboratory findings to clinical practice.
Margaret Shipp, MD, was elected to a three-year term as one of 15 directors of the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR), one of the largest scientific organizations in the world focused on innovative cancer research. Shipp is the director of the Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center Lymphoma Program and is a professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School.
Matthew Freedman, MD, has won a Physician-Scientist Early Career Award from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The career award's goal is to provide support to young investigators so that more time can be dedicated to designing and executing experiments rather than grant writing.
Mary Cooley, RN, PhD, is the first jointly appointed nurse scientist and assistant professor within the Phyllis F. Cantor Center for Research in Nursing and Patient Care Services at Dana-Farber and the University of Massachusetts Boston (UMB) College of Nursing and Health Sciences. In this role, Cooley will practice in Dana-Farber's thoracic disease center, while growing her program of research and teaching UMB doctoral students in the accelerated Bachelor of Science-to-PhD program.
Suzanne Hitchcock-Bryan, RN, MPH, is the first Dana-Farber nurse and second Dana-Farber staffer to be selected for a fellowship in medical ethics at Harvard Medical School. The program provides clinicians the opportunity to further their knowledge about issues related to medical ethics, including philosophical, social, and political aspects of medical practice.
2007 – Spring 2008
David Pellman, MD, of Pediatric Oncology, was one of 56 scientists selected in early 2008 as an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), a non-profit medical research organization that ranks as one of the nation's largest philanthropies.
Todd Golub, MD, of Pediatric Oncology, was awarded a 2008 E. Mead Johnson Award by the Society for Pediatric Research for his pioneering work in cancer genomics.
Monica M. Bertagnolli, MD, and Bruce E. Johnson, MD, were elected to the Board of Directors of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). ASCO's board is made up of oncology leaders who are elected to represent one of five distinct areas within the oncology field. They will begin three-year terms on June 3, 2008.
Anthony del Campo, vice president for the Office of Research and Technology Ventures, has been elected the 2008 Massachusetts Area Technology Transfer Offices (MATTO) executive committee chairman. MATTO is a nonprofit association of technology transfer organizations.
Kenneth Anderson, MD, director of the Jerome Lipper Multiple Myeloma Center, received honors from the American Society of Hematology (ASH) and ROFEH International for his work in myeloma research, care, and public awareness at the ASH annual meeting in Atlanta in December 2007.
George P. Canellos, MD, the William Rosenberg Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and founding chief of Medical Oncology at Dana-Farber, was awarded the 2007 Karl Musshoff Prize for lifetime achievements in the field of Hodgkin lymphoma.
Edward J. Benz Jr., MD, Dana-Farber's president and chief executive officer, has been appointed president of the Association of American Cancer Institutes (AACI). As AACI president, Dr. Benz will help shape the organization's policy on issues important to the nation's cancer research institutions.
Margaret A. Shipp, MD, of Medical Oncology received the 2007 Northwestern Medical Women Faculty Organization's Annual Distinguished Woman in Medicine and Science Award Northwestern University School of Medicine.
Kenneth C. Anderson, MD, director of the Jerome Lipper Multiple Myeloma Center, has been named editor-in-chief of Clinical Cancer Research, an oncology journal published by the American Association for Cancer Research.
Nancy Berliner, MD, co-chief of Hematology at Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women's Cancer Center (DF/BWCC), was elected vice president of American Society for Hematology and will become president in two years.
Patti Branowicki, MS, RN, CNAA, director of Nursing Patient Care Services for Pediatric Oncology at DFCI and vice president of Medicine Patient Services at Children's Hospital Boston, was recently named a “Champion in Healthcare” by the Boston Business Journal in its nursing category.
Jane C. Weeks, MD, MSc, of Medical Oncology, has received the 2007 M. D. Anderson Cancer Center's Heath Memorial Award. The Heath Memorial Award honors those who have made outstanding contributions to cancer patient care through the clinical application of basic cancer knowledge.
Jennifer R. Brown, MD, Ph.D., of Hematology Oncology, received the 2006 Young Scientist Award from the Lymphoma Foundation of America. The Lymphoma Foundation of America is a national organization devoted solely to helping lymphoma patients and their families.
Edward J. Benz Jr., MD, Dana-Farber's president and chief executive officer, received the American Society of Hematology's Mentoring Award in Basic Science.
Levi Garraway, MD, PhD, a principal investigator in the Center for Cancer Genome Discovery at Dana-Farber, has been selected for a 2007 NIH Director's New Innovator Award. Chosen from more than 2,200 applicants, Garraway and 28 other scientists from across the United States each will receive $1.5 million of research support over five years.
Gary Gilliland, MD, PhD, whose research has dramatically improved the understanding and potential treatment of bone-marrow cancers, received the 2007 Stanley Korsmeyer Award from the American Society for Clinical Investigation.
Kenneth C. Anderson, MD, chief of the Division of Hematologic Neoplasia, was recognized with the Joseph H. Burchenal Clinical Research Award for his decades of bench-to-bedside research developing novel therapies for myeloma, a progressive blood disease.
Edward J. Benz Jr., MD, Dana-Farber's president and chief executive officer, was named the 2007 Philip K. Bondy Visiting Professor at Yale University School of Medicine, the Tinsley Harrison Visiting Professor at Vanderbilt University and the Hickman Lecturer Central Society for Clinical Research.
Todd Golub, MD, of Dana-Farber and the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT is one of three young researchers to receive the 2007 Paul Marks Prize for Cancer Research from Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). The biennial prize recognizes significant contributions to the basic understanding and treatment of cancer by scientists under the age of 45 at the time they are nominated.
Jay R. Harris, MD, Chair of the Dept. of Radiation Oncology has been awarded the 2007 Gold Medal from The American Society of Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology (ASTRO) The Gold Medal is ASTRO's highest honor and is bestowed on revered members who have made outstanding contributions to the field of radiation oncology, including research, clinical care, teaching and service.
Kornelia Polyak, MD, PhD, of Medical Oncology received the American Academy of Cancer Research Award for Outstanding Achievement in Cancer Research – given annually to an investigator age 40 or under – for her work in understanding the molecular basis of human cancer.
Arthur Skarin, MD, of Medical Oncology, is the new president of the Massachusetts Society of Clinical Oncology. The organization promotes standards of cancer care and broad access to high quality cancer treatment, sponsors postgraduate medical education, and works on relevant legislative issues.
Pasi Jänne, MD, PhD, of Medical Oncology, received a Hope Now Award for Lung Cancer Research from Joans Legacy, a foundation that funds innovative research on lung cancer, particularly types that are unrelated to smoking.
Clark Chen, MD, PhD, and James Elliott Bradner, MD, have been named winners of prestigious Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Awards. Chen was recognized for his proposal titled, "The molecular basis and therapeutic implications of genome instability during brain tumor progression." Bradner's proposal was titled, "Design and characterization of highly potent inhibitors of HDAC6."
Eric P. Winer, MD, director of Dana-Farber's Breast Oncology Center, has been appointed chief scientific advisor at Susan G. Komen for the Cure, the world's largest grassroots network of breast cancer survivors and activists.
Keith Ligon, MD, PhD, of Pediatric Oncology, has received the 2007 Peter A. Steck Young Investigator Award from the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation for a research paper on the role played by the Olig-2 gene pathway in brain tumor stem cells.
Greg Verdine, PhD, the Erving Professor of Chemistry at Harvard University and director of the Chemical Biology Initiative at Dana-Farber, and his former graduate student Anirban Banerjee, PhD, have received the 2007 Nobel Laureate Signature Award for Graduate Education in Chemistry from the American Chemical Society.
Peter Black, MD, chief of Neurosurgical Oncology at Dana-Farber and chairman of the Department of Neurosurgery at both Brigham and Women's and Children's Hospital Boston, was awarded the Charles Wilson Lifetime Achievement Award in Neuro-oncology. Presented in Washington, D.C., on April 14, the honor is given by the AANS Section on Brain Tumors to recognize an individual who has made significant contributions to the field of brain tumor research and therapy.
Robert Soiffer, MD, chief of the Division of Hematologic Malignancies, has been installed as president of the American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation (ASBMT). Marked with a ceremonial passing of the gavel at the president's dinner during this year's ASBMT annual conference in Keystone, Colo., Soiffer's year-long term officially began Feb. 12, 2007.
William G. Kaelin, MD, of Medical Oncology was one of seven recipients of a 2006 Doris Duke Distinguished Clinical Scientist Award (DCSA) for his work on tumor suppressor proteins.
Robert Sachs, a Dana-Farber trustee and 21-year cancer survivor, was elected board chairman of the National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship in February 2007.
