Happy Autumn! We have had a pretty busy weekend. My brother and sister-in-law were in town and on Friday evening we went out with them and another couple to Farmers, Fishers and Bakers at Washington Harbor. It was a noisy place, but the food was good and we had a very nice time. My brother and sister-in-law stayed until late Saturday afternoon—we spent the day at the National Museum of American History and it was wonderful. We then hustled up to Bethesda to a party at Sandy Swain’s house, which was primarily for her colleagues at the Washington Hospital Center. Finally, we spent Sunday morning and early afternoon at Isaac’s 3rd birthday party. In between these events I have continued working on the CCSG site visit, of course. Carolyn Hurley, Sharon Levy and Clinton Finch did double (triple?) duty on Saturday, finalizing the numbers for accruals to therapeutic and non-therapeutic clinical trials. They have done simply great work.
Last week was really quite busy. Monday’s schedule included a dinner meeting with Sandy, Joy Drass and others to discuss the Network. Tuesday was largely devoted to CCSG related activities, but was punctuated by the sad news that one of my patients, a 45 year old woman with metastatic pancreatic cancer, had succumbed to her disease, leaving behind a husband, two young children and grieving parents, family and friends. Her disease was so aggressive that we didn’t have time from the moment we knew her cancer had worsened, to get her teed up to receive investigational therapy. This disease is so dreadful; I simply cannot wait until we understand and can productively attack the molecular triggers and immune defense mechanisms that make this disease so horrible.
On Wednesday evening I had the pleasure of speaking to a group of Lombardi Gala supporters assembled by Sam Foster, and was reminded of just how much wonderful work is done by Elena Jeannotte to make the Gala an annual success. Thursday was a blur of CCSG activities, followed by a full clinic, and then a dinner with Ken Tew, last week’s Visiting Professor. Friday was highlighted by Ken’s lecture, interspersed with lots of other CCSG-related work.
Next week promises to be jam-packed as well as we head towards the site visit. We aspire to succeed on October 3, but must not forget that the reason we must do well is because people like my poor patient with pancreatic cancer depend upon us to come up with a solution for them. It is a huge challenge, but that is why I do what I do.
Have a good week.