A united vision A united vision A united vision

The backaches. Headaches. Trouble making decisions. For several years, those mysterious symptoms puzzled Courtney Griffith, a Bainbridge Island mom of two. But in October 2022, things really went haywire. When she would get up from a chair or turn her head there was nothing but black in the middle of her line of vision. She went to her optometrist, who told her to see a retina specialist. The retina specialist ordered an MRI and she was told to go immediately to the emergency room at UW Medical Center-Montlake.

There, Griffith received a frightening diagnosis: stage 3 astrocytoma, a cancerous brain tumor that had grown to the size of a lime. On Nov. 2, 2022, she underwent a nine-hour-long brain surgery at UW Medical Center-Montlake to remove the tumor. Dr. Lynne Taylor, director of the UW Medicine Alvord Brain Tumor Center and Griffith’s medical oncologist, guided Griffith’s chemotherapy and proton beam radiation therapy, which began Jan. 3, 2023, and lasted for several months.

“She would have died in her sleep if the tumor had not been discovered,” says Dr. Taylor. “Courtney’s symptoms were very drastic. [When] she lost her vision, that was like a five-alarm fire because the pressure in her brain was so high. Her blood pressure went way down and there was not enough blood going to her retina.”

A multidisciplinary team visit helped decide the treatment: a year of the anti-cancer medication Temozolomide in higher doses for 42 days, 33 sessions of proton beam radiation therapy at Fred Hutch Proton Therapy on the UW Medical Center-Northwest campus and 12 more chemo treatments at the highest possible dose. MRIs would be required every six months for the rest of Griffith’s life.

Griffith’s story is just another example of the top-notch care provided by two renowned health-care organizations, UW Medicine and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, who have come together to create a clinically integrated adult oncology program dedicated to diagnosing, treating and advancing cures for cancer.

Courtney Griffith joins her son, Hudson, daughter, Kinsley, and husband, Wes, at home.

A new adult cancer program

Two years ago, the founding members of the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance (SCCA)—UW Medicine, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and Seattle Children’s—announced a restructure of their longtime alliance that had been providing care to adult and pediatric cancer patients since it was formed in 1998. Their collective goal was to more fully integrate clinical and research activities to accelerate the translation of research to patient care. It was determined that Seattle Children’s would separately lead the pediatric cancer program while SCCA, Fred Hutch and UW Medicine would restructure their relationship to provide adult oncology services. The adult and pediatric programs would continue to collaborate on innovative cancer research.

The first part of the restructure was for Fred Hutch Cancer Research Center to merge with SCCA to create a new combined patient care and research entity renamed the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. The new Fred Hutch is a legally separate organization from the UW that also serves as UW Medicine’s cancer program.

Fred Hutch provides programmatic oversight for the joint adult oncology program at both Fred Hutch and UW Medical Center, says Margaret Peyton, UW Medicine chief of staff. Fred Hutch continues to maintain an independent and separately licensed inpatient hospital within the walls of UW Medical Center, but the adult oncology services provided at both Fred Hutch and UW Medical Center are “clinically integrated.”

What this means is that patients with a cancer diagnosis can still be seen at either of the separate hospitals (UW Medical Center and Fred Hutch) and their care plan may include outpatient visits at either or both. The integrated approach allows closer alignment and coordination across their cancer care. Regardless of location, Fred Hutch oversees the strategies and treatment standards for the adult cancer program.

“We are two separate hospitals, but we are working together to harness the strength of both to cure cancer,” Peyton says. “That was our grand vision—to come together as two separate entities with one common goal. The SCCA structure was confusing for patients who were seeking care at Fred Hutch or UW Medicine. With this restructure, we want to make it easier for patients. Together, we can achieve more for more patients.”

Improving the patient experience

Cancer is a scary diagnosis; a patient shouldn’t have to worry about what to do next. This is where the clinical partnership has already made a real difference, utilizing patient navigation for people facing a cancer diagnosis. This has been particularly vital to creating a better patient experience, according to Dr. Taylor.

“Before we started working together like this,” Dr. Taylor says, “there were backlogs of patients seeking care, and people didn’t know who to contact after a cancer diagnosis. The changes are making a huge difference.”

A new nursing navigation team manages the “front door” to adult cancer treatment at UW Medical Center and Fred Hutch. Prospective and current patients can talk to nurses who explain how the integrated system works while helping patients schedule appointments and gather information and medical records for their care.

Integrated care also means a patient’s journey through screening, diagnosis and determination of care is more coordinated than before.

“Our experience was seamless,” Courtney Griffith says. “This was my first experience with UW Medicine and Fred Hutch, and for such a crappy [health] situation, it was the absolute best experience. The sense of urgency, the care, it was excellent.”

Another patient who agrees is travel writer Rick Steves. During a routine physical exam this past fall, he was given a prostate-specific antigen test, which measures how much PSA is in the blood. A high PSA could indicate prostate cancer and Steves was surprised to learn that his was very high even though he never experienced symptoms. He was immediately referred to Fred Hutch, where a prostate cancer diagnosis was confirmed. He spent his first night ever in a hospital at UW Medical Center-Montlake to have surgery to remove his prostate. This jarring time was made much easier by the great care he received, along with the excellent communication from his health-care team. “I was constantly impressed,” Steves recalls. “I’m glad I live in Seattle and have access to care like I got.”

Accelerating cancer research

Today, patients with a cancer diagnosis for which there is no approved treatment or only partially effective approved treatments have two options: One, find a clinical trial offering a potential treatment; or two, go without the potentially most effective treatment. Increasing access to lifesaving clinical trials is an important goal of the adult oncology program partnership.

There are more than 750 active clinical trials providing access to promising treatments, some available only through Fred Hutch and UW Medicine. This allows the adult oncology program partnership to drive breakthroughs and develop new treatments to benefit patients.

“The restructuring was really important for cancer care,” says Dr. Nancy Davidson, executive vice president of clinical affairs and the Raisbeck Endowed Chair for Collaborative Research at Fred Hutch.

As a breast cancer specialist who also conducts and oversees research on breast cancer, Dr. Davidson says that clinical trials are “absolutely critical” to advancing treatments, and that these are more easily accessible for patients under the new structure. She adds that this top-of-the-line cancer care extends across inpatients and outpatients. “A distinct difference in treating cancer is that it may involve years of treatment, and we’ve worked hard to make more of the treatment available at our outpatient locations.” She says the new relationship has helped address the consumer confusion that existed in the marketplace. Most importantly, she says, “I hope people will see us as a united team focused on cancer.”

A history of innovation

Fred Hutch has been a national research powerhouse since it was created 50 years ago. In 1976, the National Cancer Institute named it a Comprehensive Cancer Center, the highest accreditation for cancer care in the nation. Among its history of innovations are the work of E. Donnall Thomas, who received the 1990 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for bone marrow transplantation and stem cell transplantation to treat leukemia and other blood diseases; the breakthrough discoveries of former Fred Hutch president and director Leland H. Hartwell, who received the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the genes that regulate cell division in all organisms, and the role of “checkpoint” genes that determine if a cell is dividing normally; and Linda Buck, ’75, recipient of the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for identifying the genes that control odor receptors.

UW Medicine plays a unique and important role in health care in the Pacific Northwest, especially in research. It is the only academic health system in the five-state WWAMI region (Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, Idaho) and has one of the largest biomedical research institutes in the country. It grew out of the UW School of Medicine, which opened its doors in 1946 and established a Department of Medicine in 1948.

Today, the school is a recognized leader in research and education. It is home to six Nobel laureates, including David Baker, head of the UW Medicine Institute for Protein Design, who was the recipient of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. As one of the nation’s top federally funded research institutions, UW Medicine is an international leader in translating scientific findings into improved clinical care for cancer patients. Through its collaborative, interdisciplinary research approach, it has contributed to advances in prevention, screening and detection, diagnosis and treatment of a wide range of cancers. Cancer surgery, medical oncology, immunotherapies, radiation oncology and psychological aspects of care are among the cancer patient care areas that have benefited from UW Medicine research.

A game-changer for cancer care

Brad Simmons, president of UW Medicine Hospitals & Clinics and senior vice president for medical affairs at the UW, says that the UW Medicine/Fred Hutch partnership is a “game-changer” for cancer care in the Pacific Northwest. “Ours is the only true integrated practice in the field, bringing two very recognizable brands together for the benefit of our patients.”

For Courtney Griffith, this was certainly true. “We didn’t know what we were up against when this started,” she recalls. But after her brain surgery and medical oncology treatments, she found that her back problems, headaches and difficulty making decisions had abated. It turned out that everything was related to her brain tumor.

“And like a light switch, I got my wife back,” says Courtney’s husband, Wes. As Dr. Taylor says, “there is no visible sign of the tumor.”

And that is the whole point of the partnership: to bring under one umbrella the specialized focus of a leading cancer center with the comprehensive services of a top-ranked hospital so that people diagnosed with cancer can get the most effective treatment for their disease. “From a patient perspective,” says Dr. Thomas Purcell, vice president and chief medical officer at Fred Hutch, “this restructure was incredibly important to the patient experience. Patients receive better coordination of care and access to facilities.” While he noted that there is always more to be done, Dr. Purcell is excited about how the ability to deliver multidisciplinary care—a gold standard in cancer care—has been maximized. “Our patient satisfaction ratings have never been higher,” he says.

Steves, who resumed his travels not long after his prostate surgery, continues to be grateful for his care. “I trusted the University of Washington Medical system and Fred Hutchinson and I’m feeling pretty thankful.”