The Vancouver Prostate Centre (VPC) is a prostate cancer

Prostate cancer

Prostate cancer is a form of cancer that develops in the prostate, a gland in the male reproductive system. Most prostate cancers are slow growing; however, there are cases of aggressive prostate cancers. The cancer cells may metastasize from the prostate to other parts of the body, particularly...

 research centre located in Vancouver

Vancouver

Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...

, British Columbia

British Columbia

British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...

. It is a National Centre of Excellence and a designated Centre of Excellence for Commercialization and Research. It is one of the major research facilities of Vancouver Coastal Health

Vancouver Coastal Health

Vancouver Coastal Health is a regional health authority providing direct and contracted health services including primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary care, home and community care, mental health services, population and preventive health and addictions services in part of Greater Vancouver...

 and Vancouver General Hospital

Vancouver General Hospital

Vancouver General Hospital is a medical facility located in Vancouver, British Columbia. It is the largest facility in the Vancouver Hospital and Health Sciences Centre group of medical facilities...

.

Founding

The Vancouver Prostate Centre was founded in 1998 by Larry Goldenberg

Larry Goldenberg

S. Larry Goldenberg, is an award-winning Canadian researcher in the field of medicine and a pioneer in the treatment of prostate cancer....

 aided with a $20 million dollar donation by Vancouver businessman Jim Pattison

Jim Pattison

James Allen "Jim" Pattison, OC, OBC is a Vancouver-based Canadian entrepreneur who is the president, managing director, chief executive officer, chairman and sole owner of the Jim Pattison Group, the third largest privately held company in Canada...

. The Centre was first located in the Jack Bell Research Centre adjacent to Vancouver General Hospital. In 2011, it expanded its laboratories to encompass the new Robert H. N. Ho Research Centre as well.. The mission of the Centre is to "is to foster the paradigm of team-driven translational health research to discover molecular mechanisms of cancer progression and therapeutic resistance."

Research

The Vancouver Prostate Centre is hosted by the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute and the University of British Columbia

University of British Columbia

The University of British Columbia is a public research university. UBC’s two main campuses are situated in Vancouver and in Kelowna in the Okanagan Valley...

, and receives substantial financial support from the VGH and UBC Hospital Foundation. The Centre employs more than 150 people, including 10 Principal Investigators, in three facilities: a research laboratory located at Jack Bell Research Centre and the Robert H. N. Ho Centre, a clinic and clinical trials centre, and an education resource centre. The transdisciplinary team at The Prostate Centre includes experts in genomics, proteomics, bioinformatics, pathology, translational biology and oncology.

Funding

On November 2nd, 2011, the Terry Fox

Terry Fox

Terrance Stanley "Terry" Fox , was a Canadian humanitarian, athlete, and cancer research activist. In 1980, with one leg having been amputated, he embarked on a cross-Canada run to raise money and awareness for cancer research...

Foundation announced that it woud donate over $6 million dollars to the Vancouver Prostate Centre to fund research on castration-resistant prostate cancer.