On behalf of the Smilow leadership team, I'd like to invite you to join us for our next Smilow Town Hall meeting. For those of you who are new members of the Smilow Cancer Hospital community, this forum is intended to keep you up to date on recent activities, accomplishments, and future plans. This is also a forum for dialogue amongst community members and the leadership team. The Town Hall will be held on Tuesday, October 23rd in the Park Street auditorium. Lunch will be served at 11:30, with our program occurring from 12:00 to 1:00.
Yale Cancer Center Announces Annual Awards
Yale Cancer Center is pleased to announce three annual awards in the areas of excellence in research and clinical care. Each award will be announced at the Yale Cancer Center Conclave on Monday, November 19, 2012. The nomination deadline for all five awards is Friday, October 26, 2012.
Yale Cancer Center Research Prize
This award is in support of excellence in the areas of basic science, translational research, clinical research, cancer prevention and control, epidemiological research, or case review. It will be awarded to the Cancer Center investigator whose paper is considered to have had the greatest impact on their field this year. Applicant must be a current member of the Cancer Center. The science in the publication must be cancer focused. Please submit a PDF of your best publication (publication date from October 2011 to Sept 2012). To be eligible you must be either the first or last author of the publication. Email your publication to Laura Olson.
Yale Cancer Center Award for Clinical Excellence
This award will be given to the physician who best exemplifies excellence in clinical care including superb clinical skills, use of a patient and family centered approach to care, and inclusion of a multi-disciplinary care model. Nominee must be a current member of Yale Cancer Center. Please nominate yourself or a peer and send a brief nomination letter (one page maximum) to Laura Olson.
Yale Cancer Center Lifetime Achievement Award
Yale Cancer Center recognizes the achievements of one of our senior members through our annual Lifetime Achievement award. Please send nomination suggestions for the award to Dan DiMaio.
Notables
Susan Crawford, LCSW
joined the social work team at Smilow at the end of August, as the social worker with the palliative care program. Susan has been a social worker for over 15 years and most recently was at St. Francis Hospital in Hartford, where she was the first palliative care social worker on their team. Susan is already very busy seeing consults with Dr. Jennifer Kapo and the rest of the team.
Tarissa Neal
will join the Yale Cancer Center Administration on October 22 as Assistant Administrator for Operations & Administration. Tarissa comes to us from People's Bank and will be responsible for supervising our academic administrative assistants among other duties.
Patrick Blake
has joined the Yale Cancer Center as a Financial Analyst in the Business Office. Patrick has a BS in Business Management from UMass. He comes to us from the Silas Solutions Group in Shelton where he did extensive financial analysis and reporting for Sikorsky.
Laurene Goode-Gade has been promoted to a Senior Administrative Assistant. Laurene supports Warren Shlomchik in Hematology and Paula Kavathas in Lab Medicine, as well as provides support for our Research Programs.
Raymond Russell, MD
gave a lecture at the American Society of Nuclear Cardiology Annual Meeting in September. His presentation was entitled, "Cardiovascular toxicities of molecularly-targeted chemotherapeutic agents."
Development Update
Cancer patients, their families, neighbors and friends often wish to join our efforts at Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital and fund research and patient care. They often do this in very creative ways. Highlighted below are two ways that the Closer to Free Fund benefitted from people who wished to give back in their own unique ways.
The 2012 Turner Cup
Earlier this year, the Women's Doubles Squash Association held the Turner Cup Tournament at The University Club in New York City. The tournament features many top-ranked women's squash players, including Narelle Krizek (#1) and Natarsha McElhinny (#5), who lost their mother to breast cancer 17 years ago. The competition was fierce, the athletes amazing, and Stephanie Hewitt and Meredith Quick prevailed in the final over Narelle Krizek and Suzanna Pierrepont . Over $3000 was donated to the Closer to Free Fund to support the breast cancer program. The 2013 Turner Cup will again designate Closer to Free as the beneficiary of tournament proceeds.
Keychains for Cancer
Every gift, large or small, to the Closer to Free Fund carries special meaning for the donor. Recent proof of this is a letter received from McKenna Oberheim, a 6th grade student in New Hartford, CT:
I am making and selling Keychains for Cancer at Ann Antolini School in New Hartford. I have known people from my town with cancer and I wanted to try and help in some way. The school has been a big help with raising money. Twice a week, my friends and I would get up early and sell keychains. Mrs. Shaw, our principal, was kind enough to let us sell them at the school store.
We put a lot of time and effort into the project. It took a lot of work in the beginning. I started making keychains in the summer of 2011. I used my own money to buy beads and string. I made them all summer and started the year with about 60 keychains. Throughout the year, my friends and I made more. I sold each key chain for fifty cents. All together we made $94! That's 188 keychains sold!
Enclosed please find $188 for Smilow Cancer Center. My mother has matched the total of $94 in order to help support my project. I would like this money to go toward research and treatment. I hope that cancer is stopped soon.
Sincerely,
McKenna Oberheim
BJ's Pink Picnic kicks off October Fundraising
For the third year, BJ's Wholesale Club hosted a Pink Picnic at its Wallingford store to promote Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Guests enjoyed a festive lunch and special gifts. Speakers included Anees Chagpar, MD, breast cancer survivor Bonnie Lurie, and Jocelyn Maminta of News Channel 8.
The October 4th event was the kick-off for BJ's "Pink Ribbon" Club merchandise that it will sell throughout the month of October. A portion of the money BJ's members spend on these "Pink Ribbon" club products will be donated to the BJ's Charitable Foundation. The Foundation distributes these funds to the National Cancer Institute designated cancer centers in New York and New England, including Yale Cancer Center. Since 2010, BJ's Charitable Foundation has donated over $79,000 to Yale Cancer Center to support breast cancer research and treatments.
Employee Profile:
Grace Limonsani
The Employee Profile recognizes the diverse contributions made by Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital staff have to meet our patient care, research, education, and outreach goals. The staff profiled are examples of the great work being done here, and the dedication and values we possess. To suggest someone to be profiled, please contact Emily Fenton.
Grace Limosani, Clinical Referral Specialist (CRS), has been with the Breast Center at Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale-New Haven since its opening. Grace has been an employee of YNHH/ Diagnostic Radiology for over 30 years. Prior to her expanded role in Smilow, her focus was on scheduling Breast Imaging procedures. As a CRS, her role has become even more patient-centered and includes scheduling appointments for all aspects of breast cancer care including physician appointments, surgery, imaging, chemotherapy, and laboratory tests.
The most crucial part of Grace's job is working to schedule patients for a time that is convenient for them and ensuring that the appointment(s) fall within the appropriate amount of time required by the physician. Grace states that is why all scheduling requests are handled on an individual basis. There are some patients who require appointments within a few days, and Grace makes sure that happens.
"I love everything about working in the Breast Center; the staff, the environment, and the patients," Grace said. "You get to know a little about each patient that you interact with, and it makes you feel good when you see them doing well. It is a very interesting field to be involved in, as I get to see how patients progress from their initial visit, to follow ups after treatment is completed."
Sally Howell, Grace's manager in Diagnostic Radiology and Breast Center Scheduling, commented that Grace is a dedicated, committed employee. "Her focus is 100% on the patient experience. Grace has strong work ethics and will do whatever it takes to get the job done and has a great sense of humor. Putting all these together, Grace is a perfect fit for Smilow."
Funding Opportunities
Yale SPORE in Skin Cancer Developmental Research Program Pilot Project Grants
Developmental Research Program Awards are intended to support a broad spectrum of innovative pilot projects applicable to human skin cancer risk, prevention, diagnosis, prognosis, or treatment. To be funded, DRP projects must have promising translational research potential, i.e., direct application to human skin cancer, and there must be the expectation that they can evolve into, or be incorporated into, full projects with an unequivocal translational component funded either within this SPORE or as independent R01 (or equivalent) grants.
Yale Cancer Center announces a competition for The Leslie H. Warner Postdoctoral Fellowships,to be awarded for one year commencing January 1, 2013, to fellows conducting cancer research with a Cancer Center member. The Fellowships will support innovative basic, translational, clinical, or population-based cancer research. Candidates who began postdoctoral studies prior to January 1, 2010 are not eligible for this award. Up to two applications will be funded.
These awards are generally targeted towards faculty who do not have tenure - criteria generally discussed at the selection meeting include current rank, time at Yale, resources of the lab, number of lab personnel currently supported, and number of Endowed Fellowships received by the faculty member in the past. The primary goal is supporting those faculty whose lab and career would benefit the most from the award of an Endowed Fellowship. Applications must be made by faculty members and not by nominated fellows.
American Cancer Society Institutional Research Grant for New Investigators
Yale Cancer Center is pleased to announce a competition for grants for Yale Assistant Professors. The awards are to support innovative work in the broad fields of basic, translational, clinical, and prevention/control cancer research by new investigators. These grants are restricted to investigators who have not already received federal research grant support or a previous ACS-IRG award. One-year grants will provide up to $30,000 for each award. YCC members and non-members are encouraged to apply.
Healthy Eating for Life English as a second language curriculum: Primary outcomes from a nutrition education intervention targeting cancer risk reduction.
Duncan L, Martinez J, Rivers S, Latimer A, Bertoli M, Domingo S, Salovey P.
Prognostic Significance of Tumor Size in Patients with Stage III Non-Small-Cell Lung Cancer: A Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Survey from 1998 to 2003.
Randomized, Open-Label, Phase III Study Comparing Patupilone (EPO906) With Pegylated Liposomal Doxorubicin in Platinum-Refractory or -Resistant Patients With Recurrent Epithelial Ovarian, Primary Fallopian Tube, or Primary Peritoneal Cancer.
Colombo N, Kutarska E, Dimopoulos M, Bae DS, Rzepka-Gorska I, Bidzinski M, Scambia G, Engelholm SA, Joly F, Weber D, El-Hashimy M, Li J, Souami F, Wing P, Engelholm S, Bamias A, Schwartz P.
The CV library is a new resource available to our members, with CVs of post-docs and others looking for positions at Yale. Please browse the listings if you have openings, and send the CVs you receive to share.
Yale Cancer Center's weekly radio program on CT Public Radio is ranked number 2 in the world for cancer programs on iTunes. Subscribe to the show.
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Yale Cancer Center Grand Rounds
Video presentations from Yale Cancer Center members are now available online.
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