$500,000 to support Phase I clinical drug programs

An anonymous cash gift of $500,000 will help fund the lifesaving research conducted at the CTRC’s Institute for Drug Development through its Phase I clinical research program. Phase I studies offer hope for cancer patients through new investigational anticancer drugs or new combinations of novel therapies. This generous gift will support researchers who study the molecular characteristics of tumors and monitor how these relate to patients’ responses. It will also fund pharmacogenomic studies that show how genes affect a person’s response to drugs. In addition to funding a biorepository that collects tissues to facilitate studies to optimize personalized cancer therapies, this gift will provide support for novel clinical trials designed and conducted by CTRC clinicians, as well as translational studies to identify new drug targets and approaches for optimal cancer treatments.

The Cancer Therapy & Research Center (CTRC) at the UT Health Science Center San Antonio is one of the elite academic cancer centers in the country to be named a National Cancer Institute (NCI) Designated Cancer Center, and is one of only four in Texas.