The Survivorship and Palliative Care Study Groups called for expressions of interest late last year from early- to mid- career researchers to lead our new research efforts to advance survivorship care for people living with metastatic cancer. As a result of that process, two outstanding researchers – Drs Jasmine Yee and Nicolas Hart have been selected to be the inaugural recipients of the MASCC Terry Langbaum Survivorship Fellowship.
Terry Langbaum, Johns Hopkins Hospital administrator, died at 71 after more than 44 years of service to the cancer community. She survived Hodgkins disease in her 20’s treated with radiation, a gastrointestinal stromal tumor and breast cancer in her 60’s, and finally succumbed to radiation-induced angiosarcoma.
She was chief administrative officer of cancer services for the Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center for 16 years. Using her experience as a cancer survivor, she created ways to improve the experience of cancer patients during their diagnosis, treatment and survivorship. She was the “principal driver” behind the Hackerman-Patz Patient and Family Pavilion, a short-term housing site for cancer patients and their families, and the new Viragh Outpatient Cancer Pavilion.
Mrs. Langbaum helped create survivorship programs, including one called Managing Cancer at Work, that gave sustenance and practical help to JH employees dealing with cancer and their work, a program that has been replicated at many other institutions. She wrote, with Tom Smith, a Perspective piece for the New England Journal of Medicine “Time to study metastatic survivorship” [doi: 10.1056/NEJMp1901103] which has turned worldwide attention to those living – nowadays a lot longer, but with cumulative toxicities – with their cancer.
Over the next 12 months, Dr Yee and Dr Hart will lead two international research studies to develop principles of survivorship care for people living with metastatic cancer, and research priorities to advance care for these individuals.
The two Fellows will receive mentorship, guidance and support from primary mentors including Professors Meera Agar and Ray Chan, and a mentoring team including Profs Thomas Smith, Marg Fitch, Bogda Koczwara, Gregory Crawford, and Sandip Mukhopadhyay. These Fellows will be reaching out to you as experts in the MASCC Community during the Delphi processes – please look out for this. Together, let’s advance care for this group of people at an international level.
