Dr. Thomas Doyle
DuBois lands award for clinical research
Dr. Raymond N. DuBois will receive the Outstanding Investigator Award in Clinical Science from the American Federation for Medical Research at its annual meeting in April.
DuBois is the Mina Cobb Wallace Professor of Gastroenterology and Cancer Prevention, director of Gastroenterology and associate director for Cancer Prevention in the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center.
The Outstanding Investigator Award recognizes the important clinical implications of DuBois' research in the role of the enzyme cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) in the development and progression of colon cancer.
Many studies have linked long-term use of aspirin and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs with a reduced incidence of colon cancer. DuBois and his research team have made the crucial link between that observation and elevated levels of COX-2 in colon cancer. This work has paved the way to testing new drugs that selectively target COX-2 for "chemoprevention" in humans.
The award, which includes a $10,000 cash prize, will be presented at the AFMR's annual meeting on April 16 in San Diego, Calif., where DuBois will make a presentation about his work.
DuBois is a national co-investigator of a large, multi-center trial currently being planned to test one of the new selective COX-2 inhibitors, celocoxib, to determine whether it can prevent the formation of polyps that, if left alone, would become malignant. The Food and Drug Administration recently approved use of this drug as a preventive agent in patients with a specific form of inherited colon cancer, familial adenomatous polyposis.
However, the pending study would be the first to test the drug's cancer prevention potential in a population more representative of the typical American's risk of colon cancer.
Founded in 1940, the Washington-D.C.-based AFMR is an international, multi-disciplinary association of scientists engaged in all areas of biomedical investigation: patient-oriented, translational and basic research. Its activities include public policy and public education initiatives.