Volume 25 • No. 3 • MARCH 2001
Mitchell retires but will stay until new CEO is on board
MedRec archival system set for April launch; complements LastWord physician order entry
Dermatology expands outpatient services for skin cancer, aesthetics and rejuvenation services
Books on the desktop: e-Books available through Health Library
Branimir I. SIKIC
For a busy faculty member, the preparation and logistics involved in developing a clinical trial can be daunting. But cancer researchers at Stanford have access to a valuable resource - the Clinical Trials Office, which helps investigators at all levels of experience. This month Fact File talks with Branimir I. (Brandy) Sikic, Clinical Trials Office director and professor of medicine (oncology); Bert L. Lum, associate director; Amy Grekowicz, operations manager; and Alan R. Yuen, assistant professor of medicine (oncology) and a frequent user of the office.
F A C T S
1. The Clinical Trials Office was established in 1998 as part of Stanford's multidisciplinary Clinical Cancer Center directed by Charlotte Jacobs, professor of medicine (oncology). The CTO is administratively part of Stanford Hospital and Clinics and is closely affiliated with Medical School programs.
2.
The CTO offers:
- Consultation for study design, data management and biostatistics.
- Identification of funding opportunities and technologies
for cancer treatment and prevention.
- Assistance in Human Subjects Internal Review Board application and renewals.
- Information about cancer education and clinical
trials to physicians, health care personnel and patients.
- Monthly seminars about ongoing trials in various stages for researchers
and their staff members.
- Patient recruitment, training and management of
data managers and research nurses.
3. The CTO works closely with the Academic Consortium for Clinical Excellence in Scientific Studies directed by pediatrics professor Charles Prober. ACCESS has a major mission of facilitating academic/industry interfaces in clinical trials. Also, the CTO works closely with the General Clinical Research Center, a National Institutes of Health-sponsored inpatient and outpatient facility for clinical research.
4. Like all sponsored research entities at the medical center, the CTO coordinates closely with the university's Research Management Group, which provides oversight and management of sponsored projects and ensures compliance with sponsor and university expectations for managing sponsored funds.
5. The CTO provides monthly seminars about ongoing trials in various stages for scientists, their staffs, students and other interested persons. Seminars are held at 8 a.m. the third Wednesday of each month in Munzer or Beckman auditoriums. Contact Valerie Siragusa at (650) 723-7716.
6. The CTO office is in Room H-3249 of the hospital and is expected to move into expanded space in the Clinical Cancer Center when a building consolidating Stanford's cancer research, clinical and academic activities is completed at the Medical Center in 2004. The facility will house operational personnel, including database managers and research nurses, in addition to the core staff of Lum (blum@stanford.edu or 498-4536) and Grekowicz (amygrek@stanford.edu or 724-4428). Sikic, CTO director, may be contacted at (brandy@ stanford. edu or 725-6427). The CTO Web site is cancercenter.stanford.edu
7. A Clinical Cancer Community Affiliates Program offers medical groups throughout Northern California a pipeline for patients to participate in trials either at Stanford or in collaboration with affiliate physicians. Affiliate medical groups are currently located in San Luis Obispo and Salinas.
8. The CTO and its staff belong to multiple national cancer cooperative groups, which are consortia of institutions and practitioners who work together on clinical trials.
9. More than 200 active clinical trials are currently monitored by the CTO. About 50 percent of the trials are phase III, about 40 percent phase II, and 10 percent phase I.
10. The CTO manages the annual Northern California Tumor Board at Silverado, held this year March 9-11. The graduate medical education conference, a continued collaboration with UC-San Francisco, is held in a tumor board format. Typically, some of the 115 or so community and faculty physicians attending present cases and the attendees vote on treatment strategies via electronic keypads to compare their proposed plans with a multidisciplinary faculty panel.
11. Branimir I. (Brandy) Sikic received his MD from the University of Chicago in 1972. He completed his residency and an oncology fellowship at Georgetown University Hospital, as well as postdoctoral work in pharmacology at the National Cancer Institute before joining Stanford's faculty in 1979. He was promoted to associate professor of oncology and clinical pharmacology in 1986 and in 1997 was named a full professor. Sikic has served as director of the General Clinical Research Center since 1993. In 1998 he was appointed director of the Clinical Trials Office of the Clinical Cancer Center. Sikic is the recipient of numerous awards and the author of more than 175 research papers and two books. Among his research interests are clinical and pre-clinical pharmacology of antineoplastic drugs and anti-cancer drug discovery and development.
12. Bert L. Lum received his doctor of pharmacy from the University of the Pacific, Stockton, in 1976 with an emphasis in clinical pharmacy. He received postdoctoral training in radiopharmaceutical sciences at UOP in 1976 and 1977. Lum joined the UOP faculty in 1977, while simultaneously serving as a clinical pharmacist in affiliated hospitals. He received tenure at UOP in 1984. Lum also served as a research associate (molecular biology/pharmacology) from 1986 to 1990 in the Department of Medicine (oncology) at the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System, while continuing to serve at UOP as professor and regional coordinator of clinical pharmacy, responsible for an off-campus clinical education program. He also served during that period as a pharmacologist in Sikic's lab and in a variety of teaching and consulting posts. In 1998, he was appointed to his present position. He has published widely in the area of pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics.
13. Amy M. Grekowicz received her master's of public health in epidemiology and health service administration from San Diego State University in 1999. Soon afterward, she came to Stanford as data manager in the Clinical Cancer Center and was promoted to operations and project manager in June 2000. She provides expertise in programming clinical database systems and Web site design. Grekowicz began her professional research career in 1991 as a research health science specialist for the VA Medical Center, San Diego, where she served as project coordinator for an eight-year psychiatric study. She worked as a study coordinator on international health projects in Ethiopia and Nepal in 1997 and 1998.
14. Alan R. Yuen came to Stanford as a resident in 1987 after receiving his MD from UC-San Francisco. After a year as a staff physician at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System, Yuen served a postdoctoral fellowship in oncology 1991-96. He joined the faculty in 1997 after a year as a staff oncologist. A member of the General Clinical Research Center Advisory Committee, Yuen has published widely in the area of lymphomas and lung cancer.
