Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center

  Family photos tell the tale of genetics, providing visual evidence of hereditary patterns in a family tree. The same features are seen again and again in the faces and bodies of successive generations, physical traits passed down from one branch to the next that help explain why a toddler looks “just like her grandmother.” [...]

  Dell Hancock remembers the day 40 years ago that the idea for the A.B. Hancock Jr. Memorial Laboratory for Cancer Research at Vanderbilt took form. Her father, Arthur Boyd “Bull” Hancock Jr., had recently died from pancreatic cancer. The family planned for memorial donations to go to a national cancer foundation, but one particularly [...]

Twelve months after James Bradford Jr.’s, initial diagnosis of melanoma, his tumor had spread to other organs. While the 75-year-old Nashville banking magnate died 13 days later, his legacy lives on. Early on in his disease course, Bradford’s cancer tissue had been tested for the most common melanoma-associated mutations. These mutations – in genes called [...]

It’s been two years since Joan Meredith’s stem cell transplant for acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Although she is now “100 percent donor” and her new immune system appears to be functioning well, she remains vigilant against the health complications related to her transplant – like infections, for example. “I hated wearing the mask because I [...]

The best meteorologists can seem akin to conjurers – mixing scientific information about pressure gradients and wind patterns with a dollop of gut instinct to create weather forecasts that often appear magically accurate. As a meteorologist for WKRN Channel 2 in Nashville, Davis Nolan, 57, is an expert at diagnosing weather patterns that can create [...]

A few personal touches – a “Good Luck” balloon tied to a chair and Easter cards on the mantle – make Debbie and Danny Nally’s temporary housing at the Villages at Vanderbilt feel a little more like “home.” The Nallys, who are from Bardstown, Ky., are staying in a well-appointed apartment across 21st Avenue from [...]

It took only 45 minutes for leukemia patient Joe Lawrence to receive the stem cells donated by his brother Kevin, but the procedure itself was just the beginning of his quest to bounce back from a life-threatening form of blood cancer. To help him on his path to recovery, Joe volunteered to be one of [...]

Although obesity is strongly associated with several types of cancer, public awareness of this link is still lacking. Researchers are investigating how obesity influences cancer risk.

Gifts received as part of the university-wide Shape the Future campaign are driving progress at Vanderbilt-Ingram

Just over 40 years ago, President Richard Nixon signed the National Cancer Act into law. The act expanded federal cancer research efforts and marked the beginning of the “War on Cancer,” a war that has lasted four decades and is still going strong. One of the most promising developments to come out of this “war” [...]