Ponce Health Sciences University of Ponce, Puerto Rico, in partnership with the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, Florida, has received a grant of $16,000,000 from the National Cancer Institute (NCI). The grant will help to expand Ponce Health Sciences University’s research capabilities in basic and clinical sciences, strengthen the world’s first tissue bank of Puerto Rican tumors, and establish a network and infrastructure to reduce health disparities in the treatment of cancer in Hispanic patients.
Ponce Health Sciences University and Moffitt Cancer Center established their research partnership more than 10 years ago. The principal investigators of the grant are Jaime L. Matta, PhD, Ponce Health Sciences University; José Torres Vega, MD, Ponce Health Sciences University; Teresita Munoz-Antonia, PhD, Moffitt Cancer Center; and Daniel Sullivan, MD, Moffitt Cancer Center.
Partnership Objectives
The primary objectives of the partnership between Ponce Health Sciences University and Moffitt Cancer Center include:
- Increasing the number of researchers who are focused on projects related to cancer and health disparities in cancer in Puerto Rico and Tampa
- Expanding community cancer prevention education programs in Puerto Rico and Florida
- Providing structured education and cancer research experiences to Ponce Health Sciences University’s students of medicine, biomedical sciences, psychology, and residents of oncology-hematology in an effort to boost the number of future medical professionals with specialized cancer training
- Establishing a cancer center in southern Puerto Rico, which previously had no centralized resources to support patients with cancer. ■
