The president of the United Arab Emirates has donated $150 million to the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, the Houston Chronicle reports.
The gift from President Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan will support M.D. Anderson's Institute for Personalized Cancer Therapy. The donation honors the current UAE president's father, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, who was president of the United Arab Emirates for more than three decades, and died in 2004.
The donation will help advance research that would personalize therapy for cancer, according to Dr. John Mendelsohn, who will co-lead the institute. "It's our hope that five years from now, thanks to research sponsored by this gift, we will be able to offer such personalized therapy as standard treatment for our patients."
Over the years, M.D. Anderson has treated many patients from the UAE, Mendelsohn added.
About $100 million of the donation will help build a state-of-the-art, 600,000 square-foot facility. The remaining $50 million will fund pancreatic cancer research, equipment and clinical trials. The gift also will fund three endowed chairs.
With $15 billion, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan is the fifth-richest monarch in the world, according to Forbes.
The second biggest gift M.D. Anderson has ever received was $50 million from oil executive T. Boone Pickens.
[Editor's Note: Lynn Vogel, Texas M.D. Anderson's CIO, is among a select group of panelists who will participate in FierceHealthIT's breakfast panel discussion at HIMSS, where we'll explore the intersection of mobile healthcare and EMR technology.]
To learn more:
- read the Houston Chronicle story
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