Welcome to the Web site of the Robert W. Franz Cancer Research Center at the Earle A. Chiles Research Institute. We hope that you find the information you are searching for on our site.
The Earle A. Chiles Research Institute was created in 1987 as a result of the collaboration of the Chiles Foundation and the Providence Health & Services. Cancer research was established as a major focus in 1993 and has flourished because of the generosity of Robert W. Franz and Elsie Franz Finley. The Robert W. Franz Cancer Research Center was dedicated to them in 1996.
Driven by the core values of the Providence Health & Services, we are dedicated to the improvement of health care for all patients with cancer through the performance of both basic laboratory research and patient-based research. Since standard therapies often fail to control cancer in many patients, the best treatment for an affected individual is often experimental. Our Center translates the most promising results from our own laboratories into novel treatments for patients in Oregon and throughout the Pacific Northwest.
Our main focus of investigation is immunotherapy, a specialized field of study focused on triggering the immune system to fight cancer. Our research has led us to test vaccines in patients with cancers of the lung, prostate, kidney, breast and malignant melanoma. We are very proud of our accomplishments thus far and are hopeful that our work will lead us to new strategies to treat, and one day prevent, this disease that continues to take so many of our loved ones.
This Web site contains information about our clinical trials and links to other sites that will be of value to patients and their families, for example,our Providence Cancer Center which lists the many services that are available to patients in the Providence Health & Services. The site also contains descriptions of the laboratory research programs that would be of interest to potential graduate students or college graduates interested in making science their career.
Sincerely, Walter J. Urba, M.D., Ph.D. Director, Robert W. Franz Cancer Research Center Physician Director of Research, Providence Health & Services in Oregon
