Kandie Dempsey receives Outstanding Administrator Award from National Cancer Institute
Kandie Dempsey, DBA, MS, RN, OCN, director of Cancer Research at the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute, received the National Cancer Institute Community Oncology Research Network’s Outstanding Administrator Award at the organization’s 2018 annual meeting in Bethesda, Maryland.
“Kandie Dempsey is a model leader in cancer research clinical trials. Her reputation on the national scale is outstanding,” said Nicholas J. Petrelli, M.D., Bank of America endowed medical director of the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute.
“She directs a flawless clinical trials program that has been funded throughout her career — a rarity in academic circles,” Dr. Petrelli said. “The Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute and Christiana Care are better because of her presence and leadership.”
“This award recognition is the pinnacle of my career and there is no other national award that is more esteemed in my profession,” Dempsey said.
More than 3,000 research sites across the United States and Canada currently enroll in the National Cancer Institute’s Clinical Trials Network with 46 administrators across the nation leading community sites.
Dempsey has led the clinical trials program at Christiana Care for more than 20 years.
“During this time, our accrual percentages have increased from the single digits to now over 28 percent,” she said. The national accrual rate is between 3 percent and 5 percent.
Dempsey has written several grants that resulted in close to $25 million in funding for cancer research at Christiana Care, which is approaching a milestone of 10,000 protocol participants accrued to National Cancer Institute trials since 1987, when the program was originally funded.
She also has held multiple high level leadership roles for cancer research organizations nationally, including the Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology, the American Society of Clinical Oncology and the Oncology Nursing Society.