Sing the National Anthem for the Celtics!

Giving Tuesday

 

Recently I was fortunate enough to sit down with some of the nursing staff from the Termeer Center. Elizabeth Johnson, Patty Lynch, Luis Brigida, and Ed Newbert all work as treatment nurses, and Erika Rosato is the Nurse Director. You'll be hearing more about them in the future, but for now I'd like to take this opportunity to tell you a little bit about what they do.

Everyone's cancer journey is different, but like so much of the human experience there are common threads that hold throughout. First comes the diagnosis, then comes the discussion of possible treatment options. For some that means surgery, for others it can mean chemo or radiation. There are the waiting periods-waiting for the treatments to run their course, waiting for the scans to come back, waiting to hear the results from your doctor.

Thankfully, many patients have the blessing of hearing that they are cancer free. That all they have left to do is finish healing, and rejoice with their family and friends. Happily, their cancer journey is drawing to a close. Unfortunately, for some they can go through the entire process only to find that their treatment has not worked. That their cancer is still there.  Once this might have meant that their journey, too, was drawing to a close, but today-thanks to brilliant scientists, dedicated medical practitioners, and courageous patients-that isn't always the case.

This is where the Termeer Center, and others like it, come in. The Henri and Belinda Termeer Center offers patients targeted therapies: treatment drugs that are designed to specifically work on the cancer cells and do less damage to the rest of the body. The treatments they offer aren't just targeted, though. They are also new.

The Termeer Center is a research facility. They do phase one clinical trials, which means they're conducting the first round of testing in human beings. Drugs that have done well in the preclinical studies are administered to eligible recipients, then the patient responses are closely observed and recorded. This can mean staying in the center for hours under the watchful eyes of the nursing staff, whose primary concern is the safety and well being of their patients.

You might be tempted to chalk this concern up to professional pride, but all you have to do is speak with the nurses to understand that's not at all the case. The people who walk through the door for treatment are a vital part of the research done there, but they're also part of a family. The Termeer Family. Working with them, the nurses tell me over and over, is a privilege. Being allowed to walk someone through this difficult period in their life and seeing the depth it reveals in them is an honor. Being family with them-a family that encompasses the doctors, nurses, patients, and clinical staff-is a joy.

Their sincerity is apparent. They speak about their relationships with their patients and the bonds they build with each one. They tell me stories-some bittersweet-about the milestones their patients have reached, or the final precious days they got to spend with a loved one. They mention the comfort the patients can find, knowing that even if a trial doesn't cure them it may help someone else, further down the road. And they talk about the perpetual hope in their job, because there is always a new drug, always a new trial, always the chance that a cure for some specific cancer is just around the corner.  

So what do they do at the Henri and Belinda Termeer Center for Targeted Therapies? I'm not sure this spotlight is long enough to list it all. They test new therapies, yes, but it's so much more than that. They offer options to those who thought they had run out. They offer friendship and support through what can be both a beautiful and heart wrenching journey. And they offer hope-not just to those patients in their Termeer Family, but to all of us-that someday cancer will be a chronic illness, but not a terminal one.

During this season of thanksgiving, among my many blessings for which I am grateful I will also be grateful for the entire Termeer Family, and the hope that they bring. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Have you or a loved one been impacted by cancer? Want to sing along side us? Want to organize a fundraiser for us? Want to ask us to come sing at your fundraiser? Let us know!  We believe that each new voice brings us closer to the cure.