Mission Statement

 

The Gynecologic Oncology Group (GOG) is a non-profit organization (national) with the purpose of promoting excellence in the quality and integrity of clinical and basic scientific research in the field of Gynecologic malignancies. The Group (gynecologic oncologists, medical oncologists, pathologists, radiation oncologists, nurses, statisticians, basic scientists, quality of life experts, data managers and administrative personnel is committed to maintaining the highest standards in clinical trials development, execution, analysis and distribution of results. Continuous evaluation of our processes is utilized in order to constantly improve the quality of patient care.
 

 

General Information

 

The Gynecologic Oncology Group (GOG) is one of the National Cancer Institute's (NCI) funded cooperative cancer research groups. GOG is the only group which focuses its research on women with pelvic malignancies, such as cancer of the ovary, uterus, and cervix.

 

The GOG was organized in 1970 by a group of farsighted gynecologic surgeons with special interest in quality clinical research. They recognized the need for a collaborative research effort, not only among institutions, but also among the various disciplines involved in the treatment of women with gynecologic cancers. Prior to that time, the fundamental basis of clinical practice in gynecologic cancer consisted of reports from individual investigators largely derived from case reports and retrospective nonrandomized reviews. The GOG was among the first organizations to adopt a multidisciplinary, multi-institutional, prospective approach to the management of pelvic malignancies in women.

 

Since 1970 the GOG has grown from 11 original member institutions to over 50 principal centers, most of which are academic centers, and over 160 affiliate institutions. The GOG is a multi-modality group with over twenty-one hundred participants, which include gynecologic oncologists, medical oncologists, pathologists, radiation oncologists, nurses, statisticians, basic scientists, quality of life experts, data managers, and administrative personnel. The GOG is the foremost multidisciplinary cooperative clinical trial research group devoted to the study of gynecologic malignancies in the world. The GOG is recognized as the leader in the development of new procedures in each of the relevant diagnostic and therapeutic disciplines.

 

The GOG has as its main objective to provide an appropriate instrument to test new ideas from prevention of female pelvic malignancies and management of patients with such malignancies. Currently over 3,300 patients are registered each year to GOG research trials. To date, GOG has completed over 300 clinical trials and contributed over 550 manuscripts to the peer reviewed medical literature.

 

The GOG had an active and effective program for the study of new chemotherapeutic agents in the treatment of gynecologic cancers. In patients with advanced cervical, endometrial, and ovarian cancers, the GOG has defined many significant improvements associated with the use of cisplatin. The GOG has performed a series of trials to examine the role of paclitaxel (Taxol) either as a single agent or in combination with other agents. Ifosfamide was found to be one of the most active single agents in squamous carcinoma of the cervix. The results of studies by the GOG have provided a new standard of treatment in suboptimal ovarian cancer using platins and paclitaxel. A recently completed trial of postoperative patients with intermediate risk cervical cancer showed a significant improvement combining chemotherapy and adjuvant radiotherapy. The benefit of postoperative adjuvant chemotherapy had been confirmed for patients with totally resected early stage ovarian cancer. In addition, the GOG had been active in developing new mechanisms to enhance basic causation research, cancer prevention, and control of medical informatics. The Group had collaborated actively with the NCI in evaluating new data management collection and reporting systems. After more than 30 years, the GOG continues to be foremost in developing new strategies in the management of these cancers.

 

GOG continues to pave the way in gynecologic oncology trials, setting the standard for cancer research and treatment.