Basnight Named ACNO, DCI Oncology Services, Wake County
Published
From the Duke Cancer Institute archives. Content may be out of date.
Ramona Basnight, DNP, RN, NEA-BC, has been appointed associate chief nursing officer for DCI Oncology Services, Wake County. She assumed her new role on July 18.
"Ramona is known to many of you, so it’s no surprise that she brings a wealth of oncology nursing leadership to the team, having previously served as interim associate chief nursing officer and clinical operations director for Ambulatory Care Services & Hospital-Based Clinics at Duke University Hospital; nurse manager of Operations for Duke Cancer Center Cary Radiation Oncology and Duke Cancer Center Cary; and nurse manager for women's cancers at Duke University Hospital," said Monica Cfarku, RN, MSN, BMTCN, CCM, NE-BC, assistant vice president and chief of Oncology Nursing Services, Duke Cancer Institute, in a written announcement to DCI faculty and staff welcoming Basnight.
Basnight obtained her Doctor of Nursing Practice from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and is currently a post-doctorate scholar at Duke University School of Nursing. She is a certified Advanced Nurse Executive, a Master TeamSTEPPS Trainer, and Lean Six Sigma Green Belt. She has received multiple awards, most recently the 2022 Duke Friends of Nursing Award for Excellence in Nursing Leadership.
This video was posted in May 2022 by the Duke Friends of Nursing when Basnight received the Award for Excellence in Nursing Leadership. Nomination excerpts were posted along with the following message: "Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, Ramona has been engaged in creating countless new processes and modifying existing ones. She has been instrumental in creating new places to deliver care that had never been necessary before, and ensuring that they were outfitted, supplied, staffed, and had everything needed for the mission they had been assigned. She did all this while ensuring all of the existing areas in her responsibility continued to function in a modified way to adapt to the threats to patient and staff safety that the pandemic created. Challenge after challenge presented itself and was overcome because of this nominee’s plasticity, critical thinking, and ability to use what she knew in different ways than had ever been necessary before."
Learn More about Ms. Basnight's Award for Excellence in Nursing Leadership
We are pleased to announce that David Tuveson, MD, PhD, will join Duke Health as executive director of the Duke Cancer Institute (DCI), effective October 31, 2026.Dr. Tuveson, a preeminent cancer biologist, is currently the Roy J. Zuckerberg Professor of Cancer Research and director of the National Cancer Institute-Designated Cancer Center at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. He is also the chief scientist for the Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research.Dr. Tuveson is known for developing the first mouse and organoid models of pancreatic cancer and identifying subtypes of cancer-associated fibroblasts. Since developing the first mouse model of pancreatic cancer in 2002, discoveries by his lab team have revealed the molecular drivers of this disease and have led to promising new treatment options. Their approaches include designing new organoid model systems of disease and developing new therapeutic and diagnostic approaches for rapid evaluation in preclinical and clinical settings.In honor of his groundbreaking research, Dr. Tuveson was awarded the Rita Allen Foundation Scholar Award, the Luminary Award from the Ruesch Center for the Cure of Gastrointestinal Cancers, the Distinguished Scholar Award from the Lustgarten Foundation, and the Hamdan Award for Medical Research Excellence. In 2022, he was on Clarivate’s list of the most cited researchers. Dr. Tuveson was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the American Society for Clinical Investigation, and the Association of American Physicians. He is also a Fellow of the Academy of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), was elected to the AACR Board of Directors in 2018, and he served as AACR president from 2021 to 2022.As executive director, Dr. Tuveson will lead the DCI, one of the nation's premier cancer centers and a National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center. For more than 50 years, the DCI has been at the forefront of cancer research and care, bringing together more than 400 researchers and physicians to advance discoveries and treatments that improve the lives of patients across North Carolina and beyond.We want to again express our profound gratitude to Michael Kastan, MD, PhD, DCI’s inaugural executive director and William and Jane Shingleton Distinguished Professor of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology. Dr. Kastan’s visionary leadership during his 13 years at the helm of DCI helped transform the institute into a national model for cancer programs while expanding research, multidisciplinary care, and community impact.Following Dr. Kastan's service, Erik Sulman, MD, PhD, chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology, assumed leadership of the DCI as interim executive director. We are grateful for Dr. Sulman's steady leadership in guiding DCI through this transition and maintaining momentum across its missions.We are also grateful to the search committee, led by Kathleen Ann Cooney, MD, chair of the Department of Medicine and George Barth Geller Distinguished Professor of Medicine, whose thoughtful work helped identify an exceptional leader through a national search.We are excited to begin this next chapter for DCI under Dr. Tuveson’s extraordinary research innovation and leadership. Please join us in welcoming him to the Duke Health community.
We are pleased to announce that David Tuveson, MD, PhD, will join Duke Health as executive director of the Duke Cancer Institute (DCI), effective October 31, 2026.Dr. Tuveson, a preeminent cancer biologist, is currently the Roy J. Zuckerberg Professor of Cancer Research and director of the National Cancer Institute-Designated Cancer Center at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. He is also the chief scientist for the Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research.Dr. Tuveson is known for developing the first mouse and organoid models of pancreatic cancer and identifying subtypes of cancer-associated fibroblasts. Since developing the first mouse model of pancreatic cancer in 2002, discoveries by his lab team have revealed the molecular drivers of this disease and have led to promising new treatment options. Their approaches include designing new organoid model systems of disease and developing new therapeutic and diagnostic approaches for rapid evaluation in preclinical and clinical settings.In honor of his groundbreaking research, Dr. Tuveson was awarded the Rita Allen Foundation Scholar Award, the Luminary Award from the Ruesch Center for the Cure of Gastrointestinal Cancers, the Distinguished Scholar Award from the Lustgarten Foundation, and the Hamdan Award for Medical Research Excellence. In 2022, he was on Clarivate’s list of the most cited researchers. Dr. Tuveson was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the American Society for Clinical Investigation, and the Association of American Physicians. He is also a Fellow of the Academy of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), was elected to the AACR Board of Directors in 2018, and he served as AACR president from 2021 to 2022.As executive director, Dr. Tuveson will lead the DCI, one of the nation's premier cancer centers and a National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center. For more than 50 years, the DCI has been at the forefront of cancer research and care, bringing together more than 400 researchers and physicians to advance discoveries and treatments that improve the lives of patients across North Carolina and beyond.We want to again express our profound gratitude to Michael Kastan, MD, PhD, DCI’s inaugural executive director and William and Jane Shingleton Distinguished Professor of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology. Dr. Kastan’s visionary leadership during his 13 years at the helm of DCI helped transform the institute into a national model for cancer programs while expanding research, multidisciplinary care, and community impact.Following Dr. Kastan's service, Erik Sulman, MD, PhD, chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology, assumed leadership of the DCI as interim executive director. We are grateful for Dr. Sulman's steady leadership in guiding DCI through this transition and maintaining momentum across its missions.We are also grateful to the search committee, led by Kathleen Ann Cooney, MD, chair of the Department of Medicine and George Barth Geller Distinguished Professor of Medicine, whose thoughtful work helped identify an exceptional leader through a national search.We are excited to begin this next chapter for DCI under Dr. Tuveson’s extraordinary research innovation and leadership. Please join us in welcoming him to the Duke Health community.
