Cancer center celebrates 30 years of accelerating life-saving cancer research

By Michael Schug

Thursday, June 30, 2022

Thirty years ago, the national average for a gallon of gasoline was $1.19, President George H. W. Bush sat in the White House, and the National Cancer Institute awarded a planning grant for a cancer center to Indiana University.

In 1992, the Indiana University Cancer Center was born. And on June 16 of this year, the now Indiana University Melvin and Bren Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center hosted an all-day celebration to mark its 30^th anniversary of accelerating life-saving cancer research.

Throughout the day, IU and IUH employees picked up anniversary swag and years of service ribbons in the cancer pavilion and Walther Hall. In all, 500 people logged 6,625 (6,625!) years of service, drank 235 smoothies and 115 lattes provided by A Cup Above Catering, devoured 300 frozen pops from Nicey Treat and countless gourmet donuts from Quack Daddy Donuts, enjoyed music provided by six Indy 500 Gordon Pipers, and celebrated with one formula race car.

During a short program held outdoors, IU School of Medicine Dean Jay Hess, M.D., Ph.D., MHSA, pointed out to those gathered on the bricks near the VanNuys Medical Science building that 30 years ago the center wasn’t yet even a building. It was composed of just two offices.

“So really, the center was more of a concept or an idea,” he said. “But it was also reason for hope. And that idea as it was described in the original planning grant was intended to - and I'm quoting here - ‘fill a geographic void for comprehensive psychologic needs of the people of Indiana and the adjacent states to the southwest, and immediate east.’ And so, 30 years later, the IU Melvin and Bren Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center has done that and more. Our physicians are seeing patients, not only from neighboring states, but from across the country, and yes, around the world.”

Kelvin Lee, M.D., cancer center director, said that IU ranks among the few places in the world that can boast of making fundamental differences in the lives of cancer patients. And it will continue to do so with the advances of tomorrow during the center’s next chapter.

“We are taking that bright arc … of amazing discovery and advances from our past, and we're bending that into our future with new therapies that will harness the power of our own bodies, including our immune systems, to kill cancers in novel and revolutionary ways,” he said. “(We are working toward) the development of leading-edge technology with new initiatives in the biomedical sciences, wearable technologies, nanobots, and artificial intelligence to open the doorways into diagnosis and treatment of cancer that we could not even have imagined five years ago.”

He concluded by telling the crowd: “My deepest thanks to all of you for being part of this amazing journey. And, enough celebrating. Get back to work. We've got lives to save and cancers to cure.”