UF Health Pediatric Sarcoma Center

Pediatric sarcoma comprises 15% of all childhood cancer diagnoses. Sarcoma is a form of cancer that can arise from the bone, muscle, fat, joints, nerves, blood vessels or skin. The mission of the UF Health Pediatric Sarcoma Center is to provide expert, comprehensive, leading-edge care for children and young adults diagnosed with bone or soft tissue sarcoma. Our team-based approach and our breakthrough research give our young patients an important advantage.

About Us

The UF Health Pediatric Sarcoma Center consists of a multidisciplinary team of highly experienced and compassionate professionals who will provide expert management of your child’s cancer. Children and young adults with sarcoma often require a combination of chemotherapy, radiation therapy and surgery for treatment. How doctors choose to use these treatments together influences the success of the treatment.

Our services bring together expert health care providers from many fields, including physicians from pediatric oncology, orthopedic oncology, medical oncology, pediatric surgery, cardiothoracic surgery, musculoskeletal radiology, radiation oncology, reproductive fertility and musculoskeletal pathology, as well as specialists in nursing, clinical pharmacy, social work, psychology, physical therapy, Child Life Services and nutrition. We meet weekly to discuss many aspects of your child’s health and develop an individualized plan for every patient.

The sarcoma program collaborates closely with the UF Health Proton Therapy Institute, one of nine centers in the country. The UF Health Pediatric Sarcoma Center is uniquely capable of providing world-class, forward-leaning care for children and young adults with sarcoma.

Patient Care

Our cancer center works with children and young adults during all stages of illness, from the time of diagnosis through all phases of treatment and follow-up care. Our care also encompasses pediatric patients who may have a tumor return after treatment and those whose treatment and tumor affect their daily function or lifestyle. We treat patients diagnosed with both common and rare bone and soft tissue sarcomas.

Research

The incredible improvements in cancer care have all come from research. Research holds the key to developing better, safer and more effective treatment options for children. The UF Health Pediatric Sarcoma Center is at the forefront of cancer discoveries and is dedicated to furthering research to better treat and cure sarcomas. Our center is a member of the Children's Oncology Group (COG), which is a National Cancer Institute (NCI) supported group and the world’s largest organization devoted to pediatric cancer research. It is also a member of Sarcoma Alliance for Research through Collaboration (SARC) global network, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the development and support of clinical trial research for the prevention, treatment and cure of sarcomas. We are also part of the Sunshine Project, a consortium of pediatric hospitals in Florida aiming to open Phase I clinical trials in the state using new medicines that are just being developed and tested. Through this, our pediatric patients have access to the latest options under investigation to improve cancer care for children.

Complementing our clinical research, we have a number of individuals from different departments and colleges collaborating to improve treatments for patients with pediatric sarcomas. Joanne Lagmay, MD, pediatric oncologist, collaborates with members of the departments of veterinary medicine, radiological engineering, chemistry, materials science and radiation oncology in the development of polymer‐mediated radionuclide therapies in a canine model for targeting osteosarcoma.

Furthermore, the NIH RO1-funded Musculoskeletal Oncology Laboratory headed by orthopedic oncologist Charles Parker Gibbs, MD, focuses on the molecular differences of the cells within individual patients’ tumors, identifying key cellular pathways responsible for tumor initiation in osteosarcoma and developing novel methods to induce reversal of the malignant character of cells in a patient's tumor. Our center could be the first to develop novel, investigator-initiated trials testing discoveries from these two basic research efforts.