Cancer Institute names associate director

Dr. John E. Godwin has been named associate director for clinical services for the SimmonsCooper Cancer Institute at SIU School of Medicine in Springfield. He also has been appointed chief of the hematology and oncology division and professor of hematology and oncology in the School’s Department of Internal Medicine.

John E. Godwin

Godwin's primary responsibility is to develop the clinical services at SIU's Cancer Institute, including outreach clinical programs for downstate Illinois, as well as enhance clinical research programs. In addition to his administrative and clinical duties, he will help teach medical students, resident physicians and graduate students.

"We are very pleased to have recruited a top notch individual like Dr. Godwin. He will play a key role on the leadership team for the SimmonsCooper Cancer Institute as we continue to develop our clinical and translational research programs," said Dr. K. Thomas Robbins, director of the Cancer Institute. "John's expertise and national prominence in testing new cancer agents fits well with our goal to provide the citizens in our region with therapies on the cutting edge."

Godwin comes to SIU from Stritch School of Medicine at Loyola University in Chicago where he was on the faculty for 21 years, most recently as professor of medicine and pathology. He also was the director of the special hematology clinical coagulation laboratory at Loyola (1996-2006) and an attending physician at Foster G. McGaw Hospital in Chicago. He previously was an instructor of medicine at North Carolina Memorial Hospital in Chapel Hill (1983-85) and a fellow in hematology/oncology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston (1981-83).

Godwin's research interests are the biology and treatment of hematologic malignancies and clinical thrombosis. He currently is the national principle investigator for two cancer research trials for leukemia and has previously received funding for 14 grants. He led a project team at Loyola, developing translational research in hematologic malignancies.

He currently is a member of a National Institutes of Health study section, EPIC, covering the epidemiology of cancer and has participated in various grant and program project reviews of research proposals for the NIH. The author of more than 60 scientific publications, he serves on the editorial board for Supportive and Palliative Cancer Care and currently is a reviewer for seven scientific journals.

Godwin completed a two-year fellowship in hematology and oncology at the University of North Carolina, where he received a national research service award (1983-85). He completed fellowships in hematology and oncology and in general internal medicine at Baylor as well as his residency in internal medicine (1983, 1982, 1981). He also earned a master's in epidemiology at the University of Texas School of Public Health in Houston (1983). He earned his medical degree at the University of Alabama School of Medicine in Birmingham (1978) and his bachelor’s at the University of Montevallo, in Montevallo, Ala. (1974).

He is board certified in internal medicine and hematology and a fellow of the Council of Thrombosis for the American Heart Association. He is a member of American Society of Hematology and American Association for the Advancement of Science. He was named an “inspirational clinician” by the medical residents at Loyola University Medical Center (2003) and has been listed in America’s and Chicago’s Top Doctors.

A native of Montgomery, Ala., Godwin and his wife, Catherine Kefer, are the parents of three children.