Dr. Srinivasan Vijayakumar, professor and chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology, was at University of California-Davis when he was approached about joining the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

He was impressed to find that what had taken four years for him to implement at UC-Davis was already in place at the UMMC Cancer Institute at the Jackson Medical Mall Thad Cochran Center. The best of technology and equipment was there, but a full staff to support the department wasn’t.

That wasn’t a detriment; it was a challenge, said “Dr. Vijay,” as he’s more commonly known.

“This place really has great potential to build something that will help a lot of people,” he said. “This institution really wants to build a National Cancer Institute-accredited cancer center.”