CHUV strengthens its strategy to fight cancer
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The University Hospital of Vaud (CHUV) in Lausanne is expanding its strategy to better fight all forms of cancer. The institution is opening three new interdisciplinary oncology centers, focusing on the brain and spinal cord, liver and pancreas, and ENT and cervicofacial tumors.
The University Hospital of Vau, CHUV, had already been a pioneer in 2009 with the opening of an Interdisciplinary Oncology Center (IOC) for breast cancer, followed by prostate and thoracic tumors in 2015, sarcomas in 2016, gynecological tumors in 2017 and neuroendocrine tumors in 2019, it said. With the three new IOCs, this strategy confirms the role of the CHUV as a specialized hospital in the global management of cancer treatments.
“The experience accumulated with the first IOCs launched ten years ago allows the CHUV to resolutely pursue the development of this approach. This approach puts the most advanced specialists, the most appropriate therapies and the most innovative technologies at the service of patients, with resources and skills that only a university hospital can offer,” said CHUV Director General Philippe Eckert, quoted in a the press release.
Robotic platform
The ENT and Cervical-Facial Tumor Center specializes in the treatment of tumors in the oral cavity, pharynx, larynx, salivary glands, thyroid and parathyroid glands, the CHUV said. It is placed under the medical responsibility of Professor Christian Simon, head of the ENT and cervico-facial surgery department.
The center will be distinguished in 2022 by the discovery of a new surgical technique using the CHUV’s robotic platform. It has succeeded in developing a surgical procedure that preserves patients’ ability to speak and swallow.
“This is a center of major importance: of the 1,400 or so cancers of the respiratory tract and upper digestive tract that occur each year in Switzerland, the CHUV treats between 15 and 20% of cases,” he explains.
Personalized vaccine
Under the medical responsibility of Dr. Emilie Uldry and Dr. Emmanuel Melloul, privat-doctors, both specialists in hepatobiliary and pancreatic surgery, the Liver-Pancreas Tumor Center specializes in the treatment of cancers affecting the bile ducts as well as the organs of the liver and pancreas.
This center will also invest in the CHUV’s robotics platform to improve patient care. The example of a personalized vaccine for pancreatic cancer, currently the subject of a Phase I clinical trial, also illustrates the center’s potential for innovative interdisciplinary treatments, according to the hospital.
Reference center for nervous system tumors
For the past year, the Center for Brain and Spinal Cord Tumors has brought together a team of international specialists under the medical responsibility of Dr. Andreas Hottinger, a private doctor and head of the neuro-oncology unit. The center treats tumors of the brain and spinal cord, including gliomas, meningiomas, brain metastases, skull base tumors, and complex and rare brain tumors.
As a pioneer in the development and standard treatment of glioblastoma, one of the most frequent and aggressive brain tumors, the CHUV is positioning itself as an international reference center for the management of patients with nervous system tumors and for the post-graduate training of physicians.