The University of Michigan (UM), inclusive of its Comprehensive Cancer Center (UMCCC) and Medical School Departments, requests this UG1 award as an NCI National Clinical Trials Network Lead Academic Participating Site (NCTN LAPS-UG1). We view this opportunity as an important component of a large cancer research effort at our institution. We remain committed to the concept that multi-institutional collaboration is essential to the advancement of cancer treatment. Our goal as a LAPS site is to make significant scientific, leadership, administrative and patient data contributions to the NCTN effort to study and improve cancer therapy. The NCTN process involves the development and conduct of purposeful clinical trials, adoption of uniform toxicity and response criteria, collection of patient data, and results reporting. NCTN Group research is the only setting in which sophisticated concepts of combined modality and interdisciplinary therapy as well as adjuvant therapies can be properly evaluated. NCTN clinical research has also provided an improved understanding of the important relationships between prognostic factors, therapy and patient outcomes that could not have been obtained otherwise.
The University of Michigan participation as a Lead Academic Participating site (LAPS) is interdisciplinary with clinical investigators and basic research associates involved in the National Clinical Trials Network (NCTN) activities and membership in three of the four adult Cooperative Groups. This involvement in NCTN research is characterized by scientific, leadership and administrative contributions, robust accrual to NCTN trials, quality data management and protocol compliance.
