As a hematological pathologist at Children's Hospital Boston, on average, I diagnose one child with a blood, bone marrow or lymph node cancer each week. Unlike the other physicians that care for children with cancer, rarely, if ever, does a family know my name or even understand what I do. My pathologist colleagues and I are part of a nebulous, faceless hospital infrastructure that makes the hospital work, but is transparent to the patient and his or her family. Nonetheless, I know each individual patient by name. I rejoice in a bone marrow that shows that a child is cancer free, and I despair when a child's cancer has relapsed. In short, I care for each and every child directly and personally.
As much as pediatric cancer is a routine part of my professional life, it's also touched me closely and personally. I have seen how a cancer diagnosis can be all-consuming, affecting not only one child and his or her parents, but also siblings and grandparents. The distributed effect of a pediatric cancer diagnosis is not to be underestimated.
I'm riding in the PMC to support Pediatric Oncology at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. In the 1950's pediatric blood, bone marrow, and lymph node cancers were uniformly fatal. Using the then innovative concept of chemotherapy, my Children's Hospital Boston pediatric pathologist predecessor, Dr. Sidney Farber, was the first to induce a remission in a child with the blood/bone marrow cancer acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). Since then, the state-of-the-art has progressed to the point where >90% of children with ALL will be cured. This is not the case for other pediatric cancers, which continue to evade even the most sophisticated treatments of this era. I'm confident that with continued research support these diseases will prove to be equally surmountable.
Treating and curing cancer is a team effort. Patients, families, friends, doctors, nurses, hospital support staff and the community at large are among the important members that improve the odds at beating this terrible disease. We've formed a team called Path to the Cure that includes Children's and other dedicated Boston area community members. But, we need your help. Please contribute generously. All money we raise, goes directly to the Pediatric Oncology program at the Dana Farber.
Many thanks,
Mark
