OSF HealthCare Unveils Breakthrough Treatment Center
New center to offer the most promising medical advances and trial options to cancer patients
OSF HealthCare, in collaboration with Origin, is launching the OSF Breakthrough Treatment Center as part of the OSF HealthCare Cancer Institute.
The OSF Breakthrough Treatment Center will bring exciting new cancer research that has never been done in Peoria. It will provide residents of central Illinois and beyond access to some of the most groundbreaking, hard-to-access clinical trials, medical advances, innovative biotech and novel therapies. OSF doctors and caregivers will have access to new technologies, world-renowned physicians, infrastructure and research from around the world.“
Origin is focused on developing and accelerating promising therapies in collaboration with health systems like OSF,” said Cosmo Smith, Origin managing partner. “Over the next decade, the vast majority of promising therapies will be the result of the scientific community working directly with patients and their families.”
OSF HealthCare will leverage Origin’s proprietary platforms, expertise and collaborations to identify and deploy those resources that best help oncologists meet the needs of their patients. The center will focus on the most promising and innovative phase 1, first-in-human trials that have the potential to save lives. They include early detection, immunotherapies, cell and gene therapies, proton beam therapy advancements and more.
This opens up a whole new door to almost unlimited options. To have (this) through our OSF Cancer (Institute) - I still can't really fathom that people will have that opportunity. I will have that opportunity.”
Mike Cruz, MD, Chief Operating Officer for OSF HealthCare, says this very personalized way of delivering treatment to cancer patients is a game-changer for central Illinois.
“The technology that we have today, the ability to move protocols and the geography - accessing trials is quite different than it used to be. This has a potential to be an aggregator of many different types of trials,” Dr. Cruz explains. “As a center for investigator-led research with multiple adjacent and regional partners, we will have access to trials that we ordinarily wouldn't. Our physicians and other clinicians are excited about this prospect because of the care and treatment it will bring to our patients.”
OSF HealthCare is committed to making Peoria a premier destination for world-class cancer care. As part of the OSF Breakthrough Treatment Center, OSF is one of just a few centers globally working to build early detection capabilities for all cancers, especially harder-to-treat cancers such as pancreas, lung and ovarian.
The president of OSF HealthCare, Sister Diane Marie McGrew, O.S.F., knows what the promise of the OSF Breakthrough Treatment Center will mean for those treated there. She has been diagnosed with recurring ovarian cancer and is receiving treatment through available protocols, but is running out of options. The creation of the OSF Breakthrough Treatment Center is very personal to her.
“This opens up a whole new door to almost unlimited options. Because the people doing cancer research are phenomenal, they're tweaking things. They're helping those individuals that have uniqueness in the type of cancer they have. It takes into account other comorbidities. It takes in their own DNA, so that it really is like targeted medicine just for you, and to have that through our OSF Cancer Center is just - I still can't really fathom that people will have that opportunity. I will have that opportunity.”
Those opportunities - and the hope that comes with them - are the constant undercurrent of the OSF work with Origin.
“It’s what drives us to wake up in the morning. It's what drives us to work through the middle of the night and it's what drives us to get to know every single patient we deal with every single day. And, ultimately, it's what forces us to say that there is a solution,” says Smith. “We just need to find it.”
The collaboration with Origin through the OSF Breakthrough Treatment Center has already begun to engage in world-class research. Construction on the OSF HealthCare Cancer Institute continues, with first treatments expected to take place by early 2024.
Sister Diane Marie McGrew, O.S.F. interview clips
Dr. Mike Cruz interview clips
Cosmo Smith interview clips
OSF HealthCare is an integrated health system owned and operated by The Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis, headquartered in Peoria, Illinois. OSF HealthCare employs nearly 24,000 Mission Partners in 150 locations, including 15 hospitals – ten acute care, five critical access – with 2,084 licensed beds, and two colleges of nursing throughout Illinois and Michigan. The OSF HealthCare physician network employs more than 1,500 primary care, specialist and advanced practice providers. OSF HealthCare, through OSF Home Care Services, operates an extensive network of home health and hospice services. It also owns Pointcore, Inc., comprised of health care-related businesses; OSF HealthCare Foundation, the philanthropic arm for the organization; and OSF Ventures, which provides investment capital for promising health care innovation startups. More at osfhealthcare.org.
Origin is a partnership comprised of leading research institutions and science professionals who are focused on the development of proprietary and collaborative translational research and commercialization strategies. Its mission is to accelerate and broaden access to the most promising therapies aimed at complex diseases. More at Origincv.com.