interview w. Dennis Slamon

Thanks Beth.  It was a great article.  I'm so grateful to Dr. Slamon, the Revlon Foundation and the Hollywood Entertainment Industry for funding all the trials that led to Herceptin.  I especially loved the line where the reporter says "HER 2 cancer has gone from being one of the most aggressive to one of the most manageable forms of BC" YIPPEE!!!  I'll be happy if we can all stay "well-managed" with no progression or recurrence.

What a negative attitude if I must say LJ.  Genentech owned the rights to the Her2 gene and all they had was the Her2 oncogene that caused the cancer, they did not know how it operated and how it functioned, and most of all they did not know how to turn it off...Dr Slamon was the person who found a way to turn it off...to me that is what is important, not who invented what...because realistically speaking no one invents anything in medicine, it is a scientific finding and many people along the course of time contribute to the making of the drugs now used to cure or treat certain disease.,...we are not talking about the inventing the wheel here....we are talking about finding a way to shut down a biological system which one person cannot "make a name for himself, etc.." The point is he was pivotal in the process of creating Herceptin, and saving lives of many people, had it not been for him...millions would not be alive today...to that I give him all rights and all honor for his achievement regardless of whose petrie dish the gene started out in.

I suggest you read many other books first before disregarding the years he fought for breast cancer paitents.

Good comeback Mimi!!!!  I totally agree with you.

Dr Slamon has an email address at UCLA, I am sure he is bombarded with emails after that great show this weekend.  But I would love to shake his hand and offer a personal thankyou....pity I couldn't do quilting or something, to make something special for him to put in his office to show appreciation for all he has done for us. 

Just think, if not for his perseverance some of us would not have a fighting chance.  It makes me wonder what other miracle drugs have been pushed aside and forgotten because they didn't have a Dr. Slamon.  It's scary to me.

I felt the same way as Beth.  And I definitely don't think Dr. Slamon 'tried to make a name for himself' - quite the contrary.  He toiled away in obscurity until the breadth of his ( and his colleagues') research was indisputable.  I'm very grateful.