Immunotherapy specialist appointed research center's scientific director
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Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center appointed Lawrence Fong, MD, as scientific director of the Immunotherapy Integrated Research Center.
Fong — who will begin his new role on July 1, 2024 — currently serves as Efim Guzik distinguished professor in cancer biology at University of California, San Francisco.
He founded and leads UCSF’s cancer immunotherapy program and serves as medical oncologist in the division of hematology/oncology within UCSF’s department of medicine. He is recognized for his expertise in genitourinary oncology.
“At the beginning of my career, cancer immunotherapy was not a popular idea. I had prominent professors tell me that immunotherapy for solid tumors was never going to work. Part of what drove me was my experience at Fred Hutch, seeing the importance of studying the immune system in patients,” Fong said in a press release. “Now, we’re at a point in immunotherapy where we have enormous successes to build on and we really need to think about doing this work at scale — not for a small number of patients but for hundreds of patients.”
Fong co-directs Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at UCSF. He also co-leads the cancer immunology and immunotherapy program at UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Fong has participated in preclinical and clinical development of several immunotherapies, including immune checkpoint inhibitors.
“Dr. Fong’s depth and breadth in understanding the biology of immune therapies and phenomenal clinical experience in caring for patients make him ideally suited to help expand Fred Hutch’s clinical trials program in cancer immunotherapies, “Sara Hurvitz, MD, FACP, senior vice president and director of the clinical research division at Fred Hutch, as well as professor and head of the division of hematology and oncology in University of Washington’s department of medicine, said in the release. “Dr. Fong will help lead our efforts to make existing immunotherapies more effective for more patients and to develop new immune approaches to treat cancers, including breast, lung and prostate.”
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