Expanded Bill and Jane Greene Transplant and Cellular Therapy Center Opens at Roswell Park

BUFFALO, N.Y. — To meet the needs of the growing number of patients who qualify for advanced stem cell and cellular therapies, Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center has expanded its outpatient cellular therapy center, newly named the Bill and Jane Greene Transplant and Cellular Therapy Center.

The center is now located on the 6th floor of Roswell Park’s main hospital building, supported by a generous $1 million donation from Roswell Park patient Bill Greene and his wife, Jane, to Roswell Park’s Release the Breakthroughs campaign. The outpatient clinic features 12 larger rooms to support outpatient services and procedures, increased infusion space and enhanced privacy in both shared and common areas.

“Expanding our center means we can now provide a new level of care and comfort to these individuals,” says Shirley Johnson, MBA, MS, RN, NEA-BC, Chief Clinical Operations Officer at Roswell Park. “We are thrilled to be able to care for them in this beautiful new center designed specifically around their needs.”

Transplant and cellular therapies (TCT) include approaches that have been approved to treat some cancers for years, including blood and marrow transplant, or BMT, as well as newer therapies that re-engineer a patient’s T cells to recognize and fight cancer.

Roswell Park is the only facility in the Buffalo area approved to provide these adoptive cellular therapies — a groundbreaking advance in cancer treatment that also requires intensive care and monitoring for patients. Roswell Park is the first and only site in Western New York to be able to offer its patients not only the FDA-approved CAR T therapies Kymriah, Yescarta and Tecartus, but also many investigational cellular therapies as well.

“The ever-evolving world of cellular therapies continues to give cancer patients new options, improved quality of life and even, in some cases, cures,” says Philip McCarthy, MD, Director of the Greene TCT Center. “Thanks to the generous support from Bill and Jane Greene, we have a space that will support our work to develop new and innovative ways to treat our own patients that will also benefit patients around the world.”

Roswell Park’s cellular therapies program has been recognized for excellence by many outside organizations, including Optum Health, which has named Roswell Park a Center of Excellence for blood and marrow transplants (BMT) since 2005, the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy (FACT) and BlueCross BlueShield, through its Blue Distinction Center for Transplants.

“There is always something new coming around the corner. It’s so positive to see,” says Diane Walter, a patient of Dr. McCarthy’s and one of the first to receive the Yescarta CAR T-cell therapy at Roswell Park. “I am grateful for Roswell Park every single day I am here.”

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Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center is a community united by the drive to eliminate cancer’s grip on humanity by unlocking its secrets through personalized approaches and unleashing the healing power of hope. Founded by Dr. Roswell Park in 1898, it is the only National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center in Upstate New York. Learn more at www.roswellpark.org, or contact us at 1-800-ROSWELL (1-800-767-9355) or ASKRoswell@RoswellPark.org.