The University of California, Los Angeles said it has launched a first-of-its-kind, patient-centered institute dedicated to developing leading-edge therapies for the treatment of kidney, bladder, testicular, and prostate cancers.  The Institute of Urologic Oncology says it challenges the traditional model of academic departments operating independently of each other, bringing a multi-disciplinary team of scientists and physicians together as part of single organization.

The goal is to expedite the development of new therapies for patients with genitourinary cancers. About 390,000 Americans were diagnosed with kidney, bladder, testicular, and prostate cancer last year, resulting in about 56,000 deaths. The institute’s goal is to dramatically lower the death rates for urologic cancers.

 “This is a one-stop shop for patients,” says Arie Belldegrun, a researcher at UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center and director of the new Institute of Urologic Oncology at UCLA. All the experts will be involved in their care, all working together. Our goal is to bring all our resources to the patient, rather than the patient going from office to office to see everyone they need to see.”

The disciplines represented in the institute include urologic oncology, medical oncology, diagnostic and interventional radiology, pathology, nursing, basic sciences, and clinical trials. The new institute says it will allow experts from these areas to collaborate more efficiently and effectively, bringing to patients the most promising advances in medical and surgical treatments, including targeted therapies, chemotherapy, immunotherapy, radiation therapy, and minimally invasive and ablative surgery.

UCLA has been a pioneer in such a multi-disciplinary, translational approach to care and targeted therapies. The molecularly targeted drugs Herceptin for breast cancer and Gleevec for chronic myeloid leukemia, among others, were developed based on research conducted in Jonsson Cancer Center laboratories. The university expects to conduct similar leading-edge work within the institute to develop more effective and less toxic therapies for urologic cancers.

 “It’s an excellent idea to bring people together from different disciplines that overlap around a disease,” says Dennis Slamon, director of Clinical/Translational Research at UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center. “It creates a synergy that allows us to do things more quickly and efficiently.”