Westwood Los Angeles, CA.  Team Draft will be touring the UCLA Medical Center and talking with the Chief of Pulmonary and Critical Medicine and Director of UCLA Lung Cancer Research Program, Dr. Steven Dubinett.

UCLA Medical Center lung cancer researchers are developing a variety of new treatments designed to stimulate a patient's own immune system to fight the cancer. In one approach, a specific type of immune stimulating cell, called a dendritic cell, is administered to patients as a vaccine. In another approach, experimental medications are given to patients in a manner that increases the number and function of their own dendritic cells. Alternatively, a gene therapy vaccine has been developed in which patients are immunized, like getting a tetanus or flu shot, so that they develop immunity to their cancer. UCLA is an important basic research center for dendritic cell and gene immunotherapy. In addition, at any given time several clinical trials are in progress in which patients with lung cancer can participate.

As one of the leaders in the medical research community, UCLA Medical Center is actively involved in several on-going clinical trials specific to Lung Cancer, designed to evaluate the effectiveness of various diagnostic tools for early lung cancer detection, including low dose CT scan, Fluorescence (LIFE) bronchoscopy, and specialized sputum analysis. Team Draft will be going over the Thoracic Oncology Program as well as the Dendritic Cell Immunotherapy and Gene Immunotherapy for Lung Cancer.  To read more about the Lung Cancer program at UCLA Medical Center, please visit the following link: http://www.lung.med.ucla.edu/research/research4.htm

Dr. Steven M. Dubinett is Chief of the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine and Director of the Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center (JCCC) Lung Cancer Research Program. He has extensive experience in translational investigation, academic administration, mentorship and peer review. He is jointly appointed as Professor in three departments: Medicine, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, and Molecular and Medical Pharmacology. At UCLA since 1988, he is a member of the Institute of Molecular Medicine, the Molecular Biology Institute, and the California NanoSystems Institute. Building on original discoveries relevant to inflammation in the pathogenesis of lung cancer, he has developed a translational research program which now utilizes these laboratory-based discoveries in the translational research and clinical environment. Dr. Dubinett has received continuous peer-reviewed federal funding for translational lung cancer research for more than 20 years. As a member of NCI.s Translational Research Working Group, Dr. Dubinett participated in designing pathways to clinical goals: developmental pathways that characterize the transformation of scientific discoveries into new clinical modalities for oncology. Dr. Dubinett serves as the Director for Biomarker Development for the American College of Surgeons Oncology Group and oversees biospecimen utilization in the context of clinical trials. He currently serves as the Chair of the Research Evaluation Panel for biospecimen utilization for the American College of Radiology Imaging Network/National Lung Screening Trial (ACRIN/NLST). He also is a member of the FDA Cellular, Tissue & Gene Therapies Advisory Committee. 

Team Draft is excited to learn more about what UCLA is doing to change the state of lung cancer.