Dateline DFCI
New clinical building to help Dana-Farber capitalize on advances in cancer research
As seen from a park across Brookline Avenue, this is what Dana-Farber's Center for Cancer Care may look like when completed.
Plans are moving forward to erect a state-of-the-art building for patient care and clinical research at Dana-Farber to extend the Institute's leadership in the cancer field, as well as provide more space for growing activities.
The Center for Cancer Care, slated for completion in 2011, represents DFCI's first major clinical expansion since the mid-1970s, when the Dana Building opened on Binney Street.
Rising 13 stories on Brookline Avenue, the new structure is envisioned as a welcoming facility that promotes personalized, safe, and compassionate care in a healing environment. The center aims to foster scientific collaboration and expedite laboratory-to-bedside research while improving the flow of patients. It will also offer a more inviting entranceway to the Institute's main campus.
"The Center for Cancer Care will play a critical role in helping accomplish our goal of making Dana-Farber the model cancer center for patient care, basic science, and the research that connects them," says Institute President Edward J. Benz Jr., MD.
This summer, roughly 300 staff, patients, and family members took part in the planning process to imagine ideal cancer care in the year 2020 and beyond. Meetings have also been held with government officials and both institutional and residential neighbors to review the building's design by the firms Zimmer Gunsul Frasca Partnership of Washington, D.C., and Miller Dyer Spears of Boston. Funding for the estimated $250 million project will come from both borrowing and donor support.
Built around disease centers, the current plans will expand capacity to 100 exam rooms and 140 infusion (chemotherapy) chairs, and provide a constellation of patient services such as a cafeteria and pharmacy. Other features of the energy-efficient building include conference rooms, clinical offices, and some 450 underground parking spaces. Bridges will connect the center with the Richard A. and Susan F. Smith Research Laboratories next door, and an underground passage will link it to the Dana and Mayer buildings, which will continue to house radiation therapy and diagnostic imaging.
The Center for Cancer Care, which will replace two older buildings and a surface parking lot, is a key feature of Dana-Farber's master plan for expansion over the next 5 to 10 years amid growing patient volumes and research activities. Along with the new structure, the Institute is working through Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women's Cancer Center to create a regional network of adult-care partnerships with select community hospitals and healthcare centers (see related story on next page). The Institute also has leased additional space for basic research activities in and near the Longwood Medical Area.
"The current pace of discovery is the greatest we have seen in all the years we have been involved with Dana-Farber," comments benefactor Richard Smith, a Board of Trustees member since 1962 whose family has supported DFCI since its founding. "Now is the right time for the Institute to capitalize on these scientific advances."
