The Children’s Cancer Center was founded in 1974 after Mac and Cecile Burnett lost their daughter, Helen, to leukemia. Dr. Janifer Judisch, one of only three hematology/oncology physicians in the state of Florida at the time, and the Burnett family envisioned an organization that would help alleviate the stress of coping with a child’s life threatening disease.
Dr. Judisch recognized the importance of practicing the art of medicine, which is taking care of the needs that have arisen as a result of the disease, not just the disease itself. This belief has shaped our mission ever since that when a child is diagnosed, the entire family is diagnosed.
When Moffitt Cancer Center opened its doors in 1986, Children’s Cancer Center moved from USF where Dr. Judisch practiced, to the pediatrics ward at Moffitt. After Moffitt’s pediatric cancer program closed in 1995, the CCC Board of Directors voted to expand services regardless of the patients’ treatment hospital. We then became a freestanding organization that serves all children and families diagnosed with pediatric cancer in the greater Tampa Bay Area.
Since then, our stand-alone facility on Cypress Street has become home to 30 programs, a place of therapeutic programs and essential support. Our mission has continued to soar by welcoming new families and coping concepts, a depiction of the art of medicine that Dr. Judisch so passionately implemented 50 years ago.
