Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) is the world's oldest and largest private cancer center, with over 130 years of history. Since its founding in 1884 as the New York Cancer Hospital on Manhattan's Upper West Side, MSKCC has been dedicated to exceptional patient care, innovative research, and outstanding medical education. It is now one of 45 NCI-designated Comprehensive Cancer Centers. The institution has a rich history: renamed the General Memorial Hospital in 1899, it moved to its current York Avenue location in 1939 thanks to a land donation from John D. Rockefeller, Jr. The Sloan Kettering Institute (SKI) was founded in the 1940s by former General Motors executives Alfred P. Sloan and Charles F. Kettering and has since been one of America's premier biomedical research institutions. In 1980, Memorial Hospital and the Sloan Kettering Institute formally merged. According to U.S. News & World Report, MSKCC has consistently ranked among the top two cancer hospitals in the United States for over 25 years, and is also recognized as one of the nation's leading children's cancer hospitals. The center's physicians treat over 400 cancer subtypes annually, with multidisciplinary teams — including surgeons, medical oncologists, radiation oncologists, radiologists, pathologists, psychiatrists, and nurses — ensuring comprehensive care. MSKCC surgeons perform among the highest volume of cancer surgeries in the United States, pioneering minimally invasive techniques. Radiation oncologists developed intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT). Medical oncologists lead the development of safer, more effective chemotherapy drugs and increasingly use advanced approaches such as immunotherapy and vaccines. The center's radiologists and pathologists analyze approximately 40,000 tumor samples annually for precise diagnosis and staging.