Eddie Reed, M.D. , chief of the ovarian cancer research and treatment program of the National Cancer Institute, has been named director of the Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center at West Virginia University.

Dr. Reedwho was awarded the U.S. Public Health Service Commendation Medal in 1993 for his pioneering work on the use of Taxol in ovarian canceris the holder of four patents for his work in developing cancer treatments and tests. He will be named to the Laurence and Jean DeLynn Chair of Oncology in the WVU School of Medicine.

“Dr. Reed is known throughout the world for his innovative scientific work, and for the care he has given to patients at the NIH ,”said Robert M. D’Alessandri, M.D., dean of medicine and vice president for health sciences at WVU , who announced Reed’s appointment.”Our faculty are eager to begin working with him, and we expect that he will attract the very best physicians and researchers to the Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center over the next decade.”

Reed joined the NCI in 1981, and since 1991 has been chief of the Medical Ovarian Cancer Section, Medicine Branch, of the Division of Clinical Sciences at NCI ’s Bethesda, Maryland, campus. He is clinic leader for both ovarian cancer and metastatic prostate cancer at the NCI .

“The Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center has long been the primary resource for state-of-the-art cancer care in West Virginia,”Reed said.”I look forward to helping further that role in years to come.”

He is a graduate of Philander Smith College and the Yale medical school, with advanced training at Stanford University and the NCI .

Ovarian cancer accounts for only four percent of all cancer in womenbut it is the most deadly cancer of the female reproductive system. Reed’s research was crucial in the development and approval of Taxol; he also led an NCI team that developed a three-drug therapy that may be useful in helping increase survival rates for this form of cancer.

Reed has also been the lead author on a number of research papers describing findings in his laboratory that linked DNA damage to cancer; he led a three-year study of new drugs for metastatic prostate cancer; and he was the administrator of the NCI ’s first AIDS drug development program in 1985. He serves on the editorial boards of four cancer journals.

Reed will take the post vacated by Fred Butcher, Ph.D., founding director of the Cancer Center, who resigned in 1999 to become director of the Blanchette Rockefeller Neurosciences Institute. George R. Spratto, Ph.D., dean of the WVU School of Pharmacy, is interim director of the Cancer Center, and will remain in that post until Reed joins the WVU faculty in early 2001.