“Best Hospitals” cancer-care score: 50.9/100
Founded: 1989
Beds: 464
Clinicians/researchers: 200
Doctors
Research focus:
Cancer cell networks, cancer chemistry, cancer development and experimental therapeutics.
Clinic at-a-glance:
University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center’s Simmons Cancer Center is a National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center known for its innovative, patient-oriented medical services. U.S. News & World Report gives its highest grade to Simmons for use of advanced technologies and its second-highest grade for longer-than-expected survival. Simmons offers a nurse-staffed Cancer Answer Line to field general questions about the disease and treatments on weekdays 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Central, at (888) 980-6050 or by email at
canceranswerline@utsouthwestern.edu. One of the six research programs conducted by Simmons is devoted to further unlocking the mysteries of the molecular pathogenesis of cancers of the lung region in order to develop new, more powerful therapeutics. The program also seeks to identify patient and tumor molecular biomarkers so that cancer behavior can be better understood and treatments more precisely tailored.