Earlier this fall, Gov. John Bel Edwards and officials from LSU Health, LCMC Health, Tulane and the Louisiana Cancer Research Center announced a new agreement between the four local health care institutions that will accelerate the state’s yearslong effort to secure a prestigious National Cancer Institute designation.
Dr. Joe Ramos is the man leading the effort. Recruited in 2022 to lead the Louisiana Cancer Research Center, a consortium of local medical institutions, he is bringing an outsider's perspective to the parochialism and turf battles that have kept the state from moving forward in its quest for an NCI designation.
In this week's Talking Business, Ramos talks about the importance of connecting the dots between researchers in the lab and those out in the field bringing treatments to cancer patients. He also breaks down what has to happen before Louisiana can finally apply for coveted NCI status.
Interview has been edited for length and clarity.
You left Hawaii to come lead the Louisiana Cancer Research Center. What did you find when you got here?
I knew Louisiana has one of the highest burdens of cancer in the U.S. with the worst rankings and outcomes, so I expected to find a cancer center that was developing around rural health and health equity. Instead, I found after touring the state in my first month that there is a lot of good basic bench research and some amazing community outreach but a real lack of coordination. I think we had gotten settled in our ways and had not been moving hard and strong enough to pursue the NCI designation.
What is a NCI cancer center and why is it so significant?
It is technically called a Cancer Center Support Grant and it is very competitive and sophisticated. The designation has been in existence since Nixon declared the war on cancer in the early 1970s. A Cancer Center has to have really great research, supported by shared resources and that research needs to get out into impacted communities through drug trials. Education is also an important element. It’s essentially about doing the highest impact level research and getting it to the people who need it. You also have to define that catchment, which for us is all the people of Louisiana.
You said recently it will take another five or six years before we are even ready to apply. Why so long?
Because so many different elements go into play. You need to be doing education outreach, working in the communities and coordinating within so the people doing the bench research are talking to the people doing clinical research and that they are talking to the folks doing outreach and education. And you have to be doing all of that really well and it needs to be clear you are having an impact — not only in treating people but we have to show we are doing things to prevent cancer.
Not to be cynical, but I have been hearing about this for 20 years or more and still we need at least five or six more years?
Katrina knocked us sideways. We lost a lot of researchers across Tulane and LSU and it set everything back, not long after this effort had started in earnest. After the recovery, it took a while for researchers to start returning and rebuilding the research base. When the LCRC building was built in 2011, it helped lure researchers and rebuild the baseline because you need a certain number of cancer grants to even be eligible to apply for NCI status.
How many do we currently have?
We have 34 right now from LSU and 30 from Tulane. You need to have at least $10 million worth of research grants. Currently, LSU alone has $16 million.
What is the significance of the announcement in November about this new agreement with LSU, Tulane and the LCRC that now has you splitting your time as director of LCRC and the LSU Health-LCMC Health Cancer Center?
We needed clarity around who was leading this effort and it had to be LSU Health because LSU has the statewide reach. We need to be a rural health cancer center to apply for this designation, and LSU has reach and breath in that area. They are a statewide institution with presence in rural areas. The other thing is that the NCI requires that there be one applicant, not a group or consortium of applicants, and it has to be an educational institution. The agreement makes clear that LSU Health will be the official applicant.
Under this arrangement, you will now split your time between the LCRC and also the LSU LCMC Health Cancer Center. What is that about?
LSU Health New Orleans will be the applicant for the designation. LCMC Health is its clinical partner, through a prior agreement. That's primarily who we will work with on our drug trials. So I will split my time between the two and try to link together all the different pieces to make sure we have the structure we need.
So, what is your plan for the next five years to make this happen?
We need to invest in what you have and that means applying for developmental funding — grants from the NIH. We also need to hire researchers in a few key areas. That is a two-year process. Once we get new researchers here they have to collaborate and we need to make sure their research takes off here and gets applied to clinical trials and gets out into the community. It will be a lot of coordination. There will be dozens of bodies overall but different types — specialists seeing patients doing clinical trials, research faculty or (those) out in the community doing population science.
How much of a challenge is it to recruit talented researchers to New Orleans?
We are working on it. But this place is attractive for a lot of reasons and if you want to have an impact on cancer, you come to Louisiana because this state is ground zero. If you want to make a difference you can make a difference here.