Pen Bay Healthcare and Eastern Maine Medical Center Cancer Care Partner to Offer Cancer Clinical Research Trials

Ambie Hayes–Crosby, RN, CCRP, clinical research manager, EMMC Cancer Care (5th from left) congratulates members of the Pen Bay Healthcare cancer team: Tara Murray, RN, research nurse, Connie Thyng, RN, nurse manager, Blood Disorders and Cancer Center, Caroline Knight, BSN, RN, research nurse, Nadia Ramdin, MD, principle investigator,  Molly Kivus, MSN, clinical research assistant, Veronica Cormier, certified cancer registrar and Dawn Murphy, MSN, RN, CRNP, sub investigator.

Rockport & Bangor, Maine - Pen Bay Healthcare and Eastern Maine Medical Center are pleased to
announce a collaboration that will bring state-of-the-art treatment and cancer clinical research trials to Midcoast Maine. The partnership gives Pen Bay Medical Center membership in the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Program as a satellite of EMMC Cancer Care. This affiliation will allow Pen Bay to participate in breast, colon, and lung cancer trials as designated by the National Cancer Institute.

The Cancer Care Center at Pen Bay Medical Center provides cancer treatment and support, detection and diagnosis, plus a full range of educational and counseling services. The Center is staffed by an on-site, board-certified oncologist, a social worker dedicated to the unique needs of cancer patients and nurses with a special interest in caring for patients with cancer, several of whom have certification in oncology nursing.

The staff's attention to quality has earned national recognition and accreditation by The American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer since 1979, one of only 11 programs in the state and the only program in Midcoast Maine. The Center provides educational materials, support groups and coordination of care with radiation services and surgical specialists in Augusta, Bangor, Bath, Portland and Boston.

EMMC Cancer Care has offered clinical trials for more than 35 years. In 2011, the organization was named an at-large cancer research site by the Cancer and Leukemia Group B (CALGB), a national research group sponsored by the National Cancer Institute. This designation—the only one in Maine—allows EMMC to develop affiliations with cancer centers in the region that want to make clinical trials available to their patients. As of 2011, EMMC had the highest number of patients participating in clinical research studies of any community cancer center affiliated with the CALGB. EMMC is one of only a few community cancer centers in the nation to be named an at-large cancer research site.

For more information about Pen Bay Cancer Care, call 596-8969 or visit penbayhealthcare.org/cancercare. For more information about Clinical Research at Pen Bay Medical Center, call 596-8959 or email research@penbayhealthcare.org

For more information about EMMC Cancer Care Clinical Research, call 973-4274 or visit cancer.emmc.org.

Pen Bay Healthcare
Pen Bay Healthcare is a not-for-profit family of services which includes Pen Bay Medical Center, the largest community hospital in Midcoast Maine, as well as Pen Bay Physicians & Associates, Kno-Wal-Lin Home Care and Hospice, Quarry Hill Retirement Community and the Knox Center for Long Term Care. Through these organizations, and with a staff of more than 100 outstanding physicians and more than 1,500 healthcare professionals, we are able to provide the people of Midcoast Maine with a continuum of both routine and specialty patient-centered medical services. Pen Bay Healthcare is a member of the MaineHealth system. For more information, please visit www.penbayhealthcare.org.

Eastern Maine Medical Center
Eastern Maine Medical Center (EMMC) serves communities throughout central, eastern, and northern Maine. Under community direction, it has grown from a five-bed general hospital into a comprehensive, 411-bed medical center. The medical center and its medical staff of more than 400 physicians provide three-quarters of the primary-care hospital services offered in the Bangor area, as well as specialty and intensive services to the northern two-thirds of the state. EMMC is nationally recognized not only for its research programs, but also for innovation in information technology, patient safety, robotic surgery innovation, and blood conservation.  For more information, please visit www.emmc.org.