The UF Health Cancer Center is pleased to announce that Thomas George, M.D., F.A.C.P., has been appointed the center’s associate director of clinical investigation.
In this role, Dr. George will oversee the administration and management of the UFHCC clinical trials office, establish standard operating procedures for National Cancer Institute (NCI) protocol reviews and management systems (the scientific review and data safety and integrity assurances of the UFHCC) and be involved with the NCI core grant writing team. These processes are critical to NCI designation and are intended to standardize and streamline clinical trial development for cancer patients at UF Health.
“Dr. Thomas George is one of the most preternaturally talented clinical investigators I’ve had the opportunity to meet,” said Dr. Jonathan Licht, director of the UF Health Cancer Center. “He will help propel us to NCI designation and beyond through his vision and energy.”
Dr. George’s position is one of several new leadership roles being added to the UF Health Cancer Center roster.
The revamped leadership team and Dr. Licht will work with clinical, population science and laboratory-based faculty and staff to develop and implement new and innovative strategies for the treatment and prevention of cancer. These leadership positions are critical in aligning the UFHCC with the center framework required for NCI designation.
“I’m honored to have been considered for this position and believe we are well poised to achieve NCI designation by organizing and expanding our resources in an efficient, effective and collaborative manner,” said Dr. George. “I’ve personally seen the benefits that clinical trial participation can bring to cancer patients and I’d like to help make clinical trial availability reach more of our patients who desperately want and need new treatments, to help them fight their cancers while we simultaneously advance our academic missions. I’m eager to help UF achieve a national reputation in innovative cancer research and new treatments for patients in Florida and beyond.”
For more than eleven years, Dr. George has served as a clinical investigator and educator with a focus on gastrointestinal malignancies at the University of Florida. Dr. George is a UF alumnus, having received his medical degree from the UF College of Medicine and completed his residency and fellowship with the department of medicine.
Currently, he oversees the treatment of patients with GI malignancies as medical director of the GI Oncology Program at UF. Additionally, Dr. George is the director of the UFHCC Experimental Therapeutics Incubator Program and an associate professor of medicine with tenure in the UF College of Medicine. In October, Dr. George was named PI of the UF Health Cancer Center’s clinical trial site participating in Precision Promise, an initiative of the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network and the first large-scale precision medicine trial designed to transform outcomes for patients with pancreatic cancer.
For a decade, Dr. George served as gubernatorial-appointed chair of the Florida Cancer Control and Research Advisory Council, which advises the legislature, Department of Health, and state surgeon general on all cancer related matters and policy. Dr. George is also the former chair of the Colorectal Cancer Medical Advisory Board to the Florida Department of Health and the Screen for Life Colorectal Cancer Screening Program, which targets historically underserved populations. He has also served as director of the Joint Oncology Research Program — a collaboration between UF Health Shands Hospital and the UF Health Cancer Center at Orlando Health.
Dr. George is an active principle investigator on dozens of local and national clinical trials in GI malignancies including those in colorectal, pancreatic, esophagogastric and hepatobiliary cancers. He has been an active member of the NCI National Clinical Trials Network, serving as chair of the Colorectal Cancer Subcommittee and co-chair of the GI Cancer Committee at NRG Oncology. He also chairs the NCI-Radiation Research Program working group in colorectal cancer. He is a member of the medical honor society Alpha Omega Alpha, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the American Association for Cancer Research and is a fellow in the American College of Physicians.
Please join us in welcoming Dr. George as he steps forward into his new role as associate director of clinical investigation of the University of Florida Health Cancer Center.