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The University of Louisville’s James Graham Brown Cancer Center is the first and only center in Kentucky to be granted a full three-year accreditation by the National Accreditation Program for Breast Centers (NAPBC), a program administered by the American College of Surgeons. Accreditation by the NAPBC is given only to those centers that have voluntarily committed to provide the highest level of quality breast care and that undergo a rigorous evaluation process and review of their performance.
Kentucky First Lady Jane Beshear took part in an announcement of the honor at a press briefing on Wednesday, Jan. 20, at the James Graham Brown Cancer Center’s Breast Care Center. UofL President James Ramsey was also on hand to celebrate the achievement.
“This is terrific news for the women of Kentucky,” said Ms. Beshear. “To have a breast care center in our state recognized as one of the top in the country no doubt provides a great deal of comfort and confidence in the minds of our people.”
“This distinction represents an acknowledgment of the dedication shown by our many breast care clinicians, support staff, counselors and researchers to providing only the most outstanding and comprehensive care to our patients,” said Donald Miller, M.D., Ph.D., director of the James Graham Brown Cancer Center at UofL. “We are honored to be among the fine institutions nationwide that are NAPBC-accredited, and this distinction underscores and invigorates our commitment to our patients, now and in the future.”
The distinction is given after a survey process during which centers must demonstrate compliance with 27 standards established by the NAPBC for treating women who are diagnosed with the full spectrum of breast diseases, from breast cancer to benign lesions that require medical evaluation for treatment options. Three standards critical for accreditation are strong breast program leadership, a multidisciplinary approach to disease evaluation and management, and a breast cancer conference program featuring active collaboration between individuals involved in all aspects of a breast patient’s care, to ensure that optimal treatment strategies are created in every individual case.
Other standards cited include proficiency in clinical management, research, community outreach, professional education and quality improvement. The standards apply to all disciplines involved in breast care, including radiology, pathology, medical oncology, surgical oncology, radiation oncology, plastic surgery, genetics and nursing. UofL’s mobile mammography unit was noted as an effective tool for community outreach, and ongoing quality improvement initiatives were cited in areas including medical oncology and radiation oncology. Use of minimally invasive biopsy techniques for diagnosis, and disease or patient-specific targeted therapies when appropriate, were noted as well.
“As an NAPBC-accredited center, our patients have access to a full complement of state-of-the-art care, a multidisciplinary team approach to treatment that takes into account all facets of their disease, from the physical to the psychological, and they are given access to clinical trials,” said Anees Chagpar, M.D., director of the multidisciplinary breast care program at the James Graham Brown Cancer Center. “This distinction is an honor and we were thrilled that Mrs. Beshear agreed to take part in our celebration as she has demonstrated a real commitment to improving prevention and treatment of breast cancer.”
The NAPBC is a consortium of professional organizations – including the American Cancer Society and the American Society of Clinical Oncology – dedicated to improving the quality of care and monitoring of outcomes of patients with diseases of the breast. The organization’s mission is pursued through standard-setting, scientific validation and patient and professional education.
“NAPBC accreditation means a great deal to us because it is a recognition of our commitment to what’s at the heart of breast care,” said Barb Kruse, associate director of multidisciplinary clinics at the James Graham Brown Cancer Center. “And that is the patients.”
The mission of the James Graham Brown Cancer Center at UofL is to generate new knowledge relating to the nature of cancer, and to create new and more effective approaches to prevention, diagnosis and therapy, while delivering medical advances with compassion and respect to cancer patients throughout the region.
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