It is with great sadness that the Hirshberg Foundation shares the news of the passing of Dr. Wai-Nang Paul Lee, our distinguished member of our Scientific Advisory Board. Dr. Lee passed away this week from pancreatic cancer – a disease that he studied for the last 40 years of his life.

He was a mentor to many medical colleagues who pioneered biochemistry and metabolic profiling for translational and clinical medicine. His contributions are extraordinary and his publications are cited in fundamental papers in medical literature close to 10,000 times. Dr. Lee was one of the first investigators to develop exact mathematical tools to process large amounts of metabolic profiling data, nevertheless his interpretations moved metabolic disease towards a functional arena involving biochemistry and physiology named tracer-based metabolomics.

Dr. Lee was a 2014 Hirshberg Seed Grant Recipient for his project titled “Metabolic Profile of Gemcitabine Resistance in pancreatic cancer.” Most recently, Dr. Lee was a Professor of Pediatrics at Harbor-UCLA and the Director, Biomedical Mass Spectrometry Facility at Harbor-UCLA LA Biomed Research Institute. His bio can be read here.

Brandon Walters of Gemini Timing has been a part of the Orange County Triathlon for the past seven years.   Now, with his new company Five Point Productions, he is the owner of the Orange County Triathlon. Brandon was looking for his next step in the race industry and when it turned out a race date had already been set for June 3rd, it was kismet for the date of the Orange County Triathlon 2018 falls on his father Richard’s birthday.

In December 2016, Brandon’s seemingly healthy dad Richard was rushed to the hospital with what initially seemed like symptoms of an ear infection but turned out to be a T.I.A (a minor stroke). Once in the emergency room he mentioned that he was short of breath, which resulted in a full body scan. The doctors found blood clots which led them to a diagnosis nobody expected, Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer.  

Because of his partnerships in the running industry through Gemini Timing, Brandon had done races with the Hirshberg Foundation, founded by Agi Hirshberg in honor of her late husband Ronald S. Hirshberg, who passed away from Pancreatic Cancer and he reached out for help. He and his family were overwhelmed by their generosity. Brandon would receive weekly, sometimes daily calls to check on not only Brandon and his father but the entire family and offer their support. Agi and her team at the Hirshberg Foundation helped Brandon’s family through the uncertainty of this horrible disease.

Unfortunately, in April 2017 Richard Walters passed away. Agi and The Hirshberg Foundation have continued to be a support system to this day.   When Brandon took on the Orange County Triathlon he saw this as the perfect opportunity to give back to the people who had helped his family so much as well as raise awareness and funds for research in the hopes that one day Pancreatic Cancer can be eradicated.

This is your opportunity as well to combat this awful disease. Very little is known about pancreatic cancer and it is often called a silent killer. There are not “routine screens” or tests, and very few symptoms that make Pancreatic Cancer the obvious diagnosis. Help us to end Pancreatic Cancer by donating today.

Thank you.

The Hirshberg Foundation is excited to have Matt Lashey joining us at the 14th Annual Symposium on Pancreatic Cancer to share how the newly created app, chemoWave, can help cancer patients when they document their patient experience.

A free new mobile app, chemoWave, from parent company Treatment Technologies and Insights (TTI), was created with a mission to improve the patient experience and harness the power of patient reported outcomes (PROs).

When Matt’s partner was diagnosed with cancer and they couldn’t find a comprehensive tool to help navigate treatment, Lashey drew from his extensive experience with strategic research and data analysis to create his own. At the encouragement of their doctor, Lashey began developing chemoWave to enable patients to be better partners with their care providers.

The chemoWave technology not only tracks the full treatment experience outside the clinical setting (including medications, meals, symptoms, side effects and other activities), it also analyzes the resulting patterns and provides on-going actionable insights & tips to users. The result for patients is propelling them to do more of what makes them feel better and less of what makes them feel worse; The result for care teams is improved quality, effectiveness and efficiency of cancer care.

Prior to TTI, Matt Lashey served as acting SVP of Primary Research for Discovery Networks. Lashey also served as Vice President of Innovation Insights and Business Leadership at the consulting firm Maddock Douglas. Prior to that, he was VP of Strategic Insights for Lifetime Networks and A&E Television’s Digital Assets. Mr. Lashey received his MBA from Columbia Business School, after a successful career as a Broadway actor.

Matt Lashey will speak on how chemoWave enables Chemo Patients to Take Control.

The Hirshberg Foundation is excited to have Dr. Stanton joining us at the 14th Annual Symposium on Pancreatic Cancer to discuss how important it is to understand the emotional journey that cancer patients and loved ones experience once diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

Annette L. Stanton, Ph.D., researches factors that promote or impede psychological and physical health in adults and couples undergoing chronically stressful experiences, with a focus on the experience of cancers of the breast, pancreas, eye, and lung. She then translates her findings into action by developing and testing approaches to enhance psychological and physical health over the course of the cancer trajectory.

In recognition of her research contributions, Dr. Stanton received the Senior Investigator Award from the Society for Health Psychology of the American Psychological Association in 2003. She was elected to serve as president of the 3,000-member Society in 2012-2013. She also has received the Outstanding International Collaboration Award from the International Society of Behavioral Medicine. Awards for undergraduate teaching and graduate mentoring include the J. Arthur Woodward Graduate Mentoring Award and the Distinguished Teaching Award in the UCLA Department of Psychology. In 2017, she was elected to the Executive Council of the Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research. Dr. Stanton’s research is supported by the Hirshberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research, the National Cancer Institute, the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, and the American Cancer Society.

The Hirshberg Foundation supports the performance of a systematic review of the scientific literature on quality of life in adults and partners living with pancreatic cancer (in press), as well as an on-going study of contributors to quality of life and health in adults with pancreatic cancer and their caregivers. We are honored to have Dr. Stanton join us to present on Managing the Emotional Journey at the 14th Annual Symposium.

The Hirshberg Foundation is pleased to have Dr. Hines and Dr. Donahue joining us at the 14th Annual Symposium on Pancreatic Cancer to discuss the benefits of having an experienced medical team or an IPU (Integrated Practice Unit), like UCLA, to guide and treat pancreatic cancer patients.

O. Joe Hines, MD, is UCLA’s Professor and Chief of the Division of General Surgery, Robert and Kelly Day Chair in General Surgery, Vice Chair for Clinical Practice and Strategic Planning and the Director of the UCLA Agi Hirshberg Center for Pancreatic Diseases. He attended the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine and was inducted into Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Society in 1989. He trained in general surgery at UCLA, including two years of research in gastrointestinal physiology, and was then recruited to the UCLA faculty in 1997. While at UCLA he has received the Department Golden Scalpel Award for teaching excellence 10 times and the UCLA School of Medicine Award for Excellence in Education.

His research has focused on angiogenesis, cytokines, and pancreatic carcinogenesis, including the role of diet in modulating these processes. Dr. Hines’ research has been consistently funded by NIH, and he has served in the NIH Scientific Review Committee Tumor Progression and Metastasis. Dr. Hines is past-President of the Society of University Surgeons and has served as the Vice-President of the Pacific Coast Surgical Association, President of the Southern California Chapter of the American College of Surgeons, and now on the Board of Governors of the American College of Surgeons and as a Director of the American Board of Surgery. Dr. Hines was awarded the American College of Surgeons Traveling Fellowship to Germany in 2005, and was a James IV Traveling Fellow in 2011. He serves on the editorial boards of Annals of Surgery, Surgery, Journal of Gastrointestinal Surgery, JAMA Surgery, and is an associate editor of the Yearbook of Surgery and Maignot’s Abdominal Operations.

Timothy Donahue, MD, is the Associate Professor of Surgery at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and the Chief of the Division of Surgical Oncology and Vice Chair for Cancer Surgery in the Department of Surgery. Dr. Donahue attended Northwestern University where he received both his Bachelor’s degree and Medical degree. Upon completion, he continued his surgical and research training at UCLA. In 2009, he was appointed faculty and has made strides at UCLA ever since.

Dr. Donahue oversees all of cancer surgery including the pancreatic cancer program, which is one of the largest in the nation. In addition, Dr. Donahue is also the Program Director of the General Surgery Residency Program at UCLA. He is a very diverse pancreatic surgeon who works diligently performing up to four pancreatic surgeries per week. He is genuinely interested in caring for patients with pancreatic cancer. His clinical research is focused on improving the care of patients with borderline resectable or locally advanced disease. Dr. Donahue is a strong advocate of prolonged preoperative chemo or radiation therapy for this group of patients to optimally select those who will benefit from a surgical resection. As a result of this approach, Dr. Donahue and his team have among the best survival rates in this specialty.

Dr. Hines and Dr. Donahue will present on Team Approach for the Management of Pancreatic Cancer at the 14th Annual Symposum.

The Hirshberg Foundation is excited to have Dr. Margaret Tempero joining us at the 14th Annual Symposium on Pancreatic Cancer to share important information about what you need to know and understand once diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and the best treatment options that are available.

Margaret A. Tempero, MD, is Director, UCSF Pancreas Center and Leader of the UCSF Pancreas Cancer Program. She oversees a full portfolio of projects from risk assessment to early detection, biology, and therapeutics in pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors and pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.

Dr. Tempero’s personal research career has focused on pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), especially in the area of investigational therapeutics. She was a pioneer in the use of antibody-based therapies and helped develop the fixed dose rate concept for gemcitabine. Her group has developed effective gemcitabine combinations and provided a foundation for using CA19-9 as a surrogate for survival in clinical trials, and currently is assessing molecular subtypes and molecular enrichment for selecting new drugs for clinical evaluation.

Dr. Tempero directed the first Gastrointestinal Specialized Programs of Research Excellence (GI SPORE) devoted to pancreatic cancer when she was on the faculty of the University of Nebraska and subsequently led the NCI funded U54 Molecular Target Assessment Team at UCSF. She is currently a DreamTeam P.I. on a Stand Up To Cancer grant entitled “Transforming pancreatic cancer from a death sentence into a treatable disease.” As a thought leader, Dr. Tempero organized the first Pancreas Cancer Think Tank in 1999 and co-led the NCI sponsored Progress Review Group on Pancreatic Cancer in 2000. She has served as the Chair of the NCCN Guidelines Panel on Pancreatic Cancer since 2000. She also serves as co-chair on the Pancreas Task Force Tissue Acquisition Working Group for the NCI intergroup and co-organized the State of the Science meeting on pancreatic cancer at the NCI.

Dr. Tempero has extensive experience in scientific review and administration, training and oversight. It is an honor to have her present Navigating from Diagnosis to Treatment at the 14th Annual Symposium.