Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group

The Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) began in 1955 as one of the first publicly funded cooperative groups to perform multi-center clinical trials for cancer research. A cooperative group in oncology constitutes a large network of private and public medical institutions that work toward developing various protocols for effective cancer treatments. Institutional members include universities, medical centers, governments, and other cooperative groups. These institutions share the common goal of ultimately curing cancer. Research results are often provided to the worldwide medical community through scientific publications, but ECOG also works closely with the pharmaceutical industry to test potential cancer drugs.

According to ECOG's website, there are "more than 90 active clinical trials in all types of adult malignancies. Annual accrual is 6,000 patients, with more than 20,000 patients in follow-up."

ECOG's coordinating center is based in Boston, Massachusetts while its Group Chair's office is located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

The Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group has all of its protocol-driven cases reviewed at the Quality Assurance Review Center (QARC). As mandated by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), every radiotherapy (RT) department participating in an ECOG study submits their data to QARC for review. QARC is located in Lincoln, Rhode Island and reviews thousands of RT cases per year. The center was founded in 1977 as a not-for-profit health care organization designed to provide quality assurance for CALGB studies. Radiotherapy data from around one-thousand hospitals in both the United States and abroad is reviewed and archived at QARC.

...
Wikipedia