Message from our Medical Director

Let me start with a personal story: My first job after I completed my education and training in cardiothoracic surgery at the University of Michigan was at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. I was so proud to work there. Over 16 years, I grew to understand the philosophy, culture and model of cancer care that propelled MD Anderson to rank consistently as one of the leading cancer centers in the nation. Their patient-centered care was delivered by a team of committed, full-time cancer-care experts who coordinated with the patient’s own physician to recommend the optimal treatment plan.

After 12 additional years of leadership experience at Vanderbilt University, I was asked to serve as the first medical director of Baptist MD Anderson Cancer Center in 2015. I joined a visionary team at Baptist Health and MD Anderson to bring this special approach to cancer care to patients in Northeast Florida and beyond. I feel blessed that our ‘bag of tools,’ as referenced in the poem on page 4, has included the skill and knowledge of so many as we have grown and developed the center.

Baptist MD Anderson is one of only five cancer centers nationwide to partner with MD Anderson. More than displaying our names on buildings, our clinical partnership means we work together closely with our colleagues in Houston and commit to the same protocols and practice standards used in their proven model of multidisciplinary care. You can learn more about our partnership on page 10.

Today, we embrace and expand this multidisciplinary standard-of-care model to provide novel clinical trials for our patients – for tomorrow’s care, today! We can offer these innovative treatment options as a consequence of our highly trained and compassionate physicians across all specialties. In 2021 alone, we successfully recruited seven new physicians from our nation’s leading cancer programs and universities.

Our partnership means we replicate MD Anderson’s philosophy of care and their approach of putting the patient first. We strive to understand the patients’ personal needs as we continue to expand our highly customized prevention and screening programs for breast and lung cancer. In addition, we will soon launch a Baptist Health Precision Health program that includes Baptist MD Anderson’s current genetic, diagnostic and treatment plans. We envision that we will transform cancer care from treating a newly diagnosed cancer, to one that can predict or prevent future cancer through genetic and other diagnostic data. See page 42 for more information.

We have all been through so much during the pandemic, and as we move ahead, our goal is to remain steadfast in providing patient-centered, compassionate, multidisciplinary care with our partner – our colleagues – at MD Anderson to accomplish our shared mission of Making Cancer History®!

Very sincerely,

Joe B. “Bill” Putnam, Jr., MD, FACS