San Pedro, CA - February 12, 2008
Los Angeles County is considered a "hotspot" for
asbestos cancer. In fact, according to the Environmental
Working Group, for the years 1979-2001, Los Angeles County
recorded the highest incidence of mesothelioma in the
country. Despite being ground zero for meso, for many years
mesothelioma patients who live here have been advised that
the extra-pleural pneumonectomy is the only real hope and
the only doctor qualified to perform the surgery practices
2,987 miles away in Boston.
West Coast patients who want to pursue the EPP have a
choice. Instead of flying to Boston, they can seek
treatment from the very same surgeon who operated on
mesothelioma patients with Dr. Sugarbaker in Boston from
1992 to 1994 as resident and chief resident of thoracic
surgery at Harvard's Brigham and Women's Hospital.
His name is Dr. Kemp Kernstine, director of the department
of thoracic surgery and lung cancer program at the City of
Hope National Medical Center in Duarte, California, just
outside of Los Angeles. Like his colleague, Dr. Robert
Cameron of UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, Dr.
Kernstine is one of a handful of thoracic surgeons
nationwide with expertise in treating mesothelioma who also
has a passion for advancing benchwork research on early
diagnosis and novel therapies.
Dr. Kernstine takes a pragmatic and humble approach to
treating mesothelioma. He believes strongly in the merits
of the EPP, but he's not convinced in all cases that
the EPP is superior to the P/D. He encourages his patients
to consult with as many qualified mesothelioma experts as
possible. "I encourage patients to get as much
information as they can," he says. "There is no
standard of care for this disease, and there certainly
isn't a magic bullet."
With refreshing candor for a surgeon who learned his craft
at Brigham and Women's Hospital, regarded as the home
of the multi-modal therapy which features the EPP, Dr.
Kernstine has high praise for surgeons such as Dr. Cameron
who pursue the P/D. "I would absolutely recommend to
mesothelioma patients that they get a second opinion from
Bob." In fact, he recently helped a 50 year-old
pleural mesothelioma patient arrange a consultation with
Dr. Cameron.
City of Hope is one of the oldest cancer centers in the
U.S., and was one of three hospitals originally designated
as a cancer center by the U.S. government. As a member of
the
Southwest Oncology Group, Dr. Kernstine is part of the
umbrella organization for mesothelioma research that is one
of the largest of the National Cancer Institute-supported
cancer clinical trials cooperative groups in the United
States. "The group focusing on mesothelioma includes
non-surgeons," Dr. Kernstine explains, "because
there are mesothelioma patients for whom surgery isn't
an option." Helping develop treatment protocols and
flexibility are part of his approach to a poorly understood
and aggressive disease.
"At the same time, if a patient has a big, bulky
tumor, you need an aggressive approach. If they don't
have a lot of disease you can do other things. But for a
bulky tumor, with no systemic spread, no nodal involvement,
and no mediastinal involvement, the EPP is
preferable." Dr. Kernstine is optimistic about
possibilities for screening and early detection.
"Looking at RNA and DNA to screen for recurrence has
promise as well," he says.
With Dr. Cameron performing the P/D and his colleague and
friend Dr. Kernstine performing the EPP, Los Angeles is a
one-stop shop for mesothelioma patients. For more
information about Dr. Kernstine and his mesothelioma
treatment protocol, or to arrange a consultation, please
call 626-256-4673.
Support the Ban
Asbestos Ac
Legislation's never perfect. But the
Ban Asbestos Act sponsored by Senator Patty Murray gets
it 99 percent right, and we support it, along with the 100
other U.S. senators who voted unanimously to approve the
bill.
Let your congresswoman or congressman know that you support
House bill
H.R. 3339, the companion legislation now up for
consideration by the House Energy and Commerce
Committee.
When the
Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation was asked more
than six years ago by Sen. Murray to draft language for a
bill that would create a funding stream for benchwork
research and treatment strategies, the doctors and
advocates on the Meso Foundation's board jumped at the
opportunity to help. The bill contained three crucial
"first step" provisions which would, for the
first time ever, compel the National Insitute of Health to
fund research on asbestos-related cancers. It would have
funded a registry for mesothelioma incidence, and would
have allocated more than $4 million per year for treatment
programs at respected cancer centers. The foundation
lobbied hard for the creation of a database, tissue bank,
and funding for research centers of excellence.
Before this initial push there was little effort to direct
national funding in a coordinated, collaborative effort
towards basic and applied mesothelioma research. At the
time, it seemed like asking for the moon. The federal
government had simply cast a blind on eye on the research
and treatment needs of the asbestos disease epidemic.
Thanks to Sen. Murray's legislation, the moon is now
well within reach. The current Ban Asbestos Act, if passed,
goes far beyond those original goals and provides
$10,000,000 for asbestos disease research in its first four
years alone in the form of grants to network institutions
researching asbestos-related diseases. The research that
this bill will initiate is staggering, but a review of its
provisions shows that for the first time federal, state,
and local efforts will collaborate and be coordinated to
actually find a treatment and cure for mesothelioma.
Critics who correctly note that the bill does not ban all
forms of asbestos have a legitimate complaint about the
last minute shenanigans that led to this disappointing
exception, but this is not a valid reason for derailing the
entire bill. Much of the bill's success has been due to
the fact that its supporters have refused to be drawn into
issues of causation, the one area that will elicit the
full-blown wrath and opposition of the asbestos industry.
The bill's neutral focus on developing better treatment
through research led to an extraordinary alliance between
asbestos industry advocates, anti-asbestos advocates,
doctors, and trial lawyers. The Ban Asbestos Act currently
awaiting congressional approval is true to that initial aim
of fighting asbestos disease through funding research.
"This bill will end the orphan status of mesothelioma,
where hospitals are forced to beggar their resources as
isolated fiefdoms, and where the world's leading
researchers are forced to research, treat, and study in a
relative vacuum. Asbestos diseases for too long have been a
clear and present danger that have gone unnoticed by our
government. Under this bill, the federal government will at
least take a first step towards stopping the reign of
asbestos terror. The bill won't eliminate all asbestos
dangers, nor will it fund research commensurate with the
scope and evil of the asbestos epidemic, but under our
current regime, it's much better than the alternative,
which amounts to simply waiting for all occupationally
exposed Americans to die," says attorney and advocate
Roger Worthington.
For fiscal years 2008-2012, the NIH, in collaboration with
federal, state, and local agencies, will establish an
asbestos-related disease research and treatment network to
support the detection, prevention, treatment, and cure of
asbestos-related diseases, with particular emphasis on
malignant mesothelioma. The network brings together
research initiatives of the National Institutes of Health,
and at least ten outside asbestos-related disease research
and treatment centers.
These centers will consist of nonprofit hospitals,
universities, or medical/research institutions that have
exemplary experience and qualifications in research and
treatment of asbestos-related diseases, access to an
appropriate population of patients with asbestos-related
diseases, and are geographically distributed throughout the
United States, with special consideration given to areas of
high incidence of illness.
In addition, the centers will conduct laboratory and
clinical research, including clinical trials, relating to
mechanisms for effective therapeutic treatment, early
detection and prevention, palliation of symptoms, and pain
management. They will offer patients travel and lodging
assistance as necessary to accommodate the maximum number
of patients practicable, and serve patients at centers able
to conduct meaningful clinical trials. Crucially, they will
collaborate with the Department of Veterans Affairs to
provide research benefits and care to veterans who have
suffered excessively from asbestos-related diseases,
particularly mesothelioma, and coordinate the research and
treatment efforts of the center with the network and the
National Virtual Mesothelioma Registry and Tissue Bank.
The bill also directs the NIH to provide to each center a
grant of $1,000,000 to support the detection, prevention,
treatment, and cure of asbestos-related diseases, with
particular emphasis on malignant mesothelioma. Additional
research initiatives in the bill are provided by directing
the Department of Defense to support research on
mesothelioma and other asbestos-related diseases that has
clear scientific value and direct relevance to the health
of members and veterans of the armed forces, with the goal
of advancing the understanding, early detection, and
treatment.
The research provisions alone make the legislation worthy
of our support. But the fact that it passed the U.S. Senate
on a vote of 100 to 0 in a day and age when no one can
agree on anything, and the fact that its companion bill now
awaits action in the House as
H.R. 3339 mean that the time to support this bill is
here and now.
According to Dr. Robert Cameron, who drafted the original
language for the earlier bill's research provisions in
2001, "Every year we wait, thousands more people are
condemned to die from asbestos poisoning. The time to act
was 30 years ago. Whatever the best answer is, more foot
dragging and apathy are not a part of it."
With 10,000 or more Americans dying every year from
asbestos, with the bulk of those exposures having occurred
in industrial/construction trades and in the navy, the
science is clear that there is no safe threshold for
asbestos exposure. Lest anyone equivocate, we believe that
all asbestos is evil, and anyone who inhales it is at risk,
without regard to age, fitness, wealth, power, gender, or
skin color. Because we back this landmark bill does not
mean we discount the evils of taconite, vermiculite, or any
of the other toxic poisons that even today the
asbestosiform mineral industry is unleashing into the
marketplace.
We agree with the Meso Foundation's official position
on the bill. The full statement by executive director Chris
Hahn
can be read here.
Make no mistake about it: this law will help mesothelioma
sufferers right now. The bill's not perfect, and it
won't help everyone. If this is the best law we can
come up with after eight years of struggle, of investment,
of coalition-building, and of non-stop lobbying, what
chance do we realistically have of a "perfect"
bill if this one fails? Legislation takes momentum, and
this bill has it. We would rather accept a compromise that
is 99% in our favor rather than the complete defeat that
will result if this bill fails.
This bill may be able prolong lives today and will clearly
pony up more federal dollars to cure mesothelioma tomorrow.
It will put millions at the disposal of scientists and
surgeons whose lives have been devoted to beating this
scourge. Let's use it as a starting point to get the
ball rolling. Perfection can wait.
Washington
judge rejects Volkswagen's attack on domestic
partners
Judge Mary Roberts of Washington Superior Court rejected
Volkswagen's effort to perpetuate discrimination
against domestic partners when she overruled the
automaker's blatantly discriminatory motion that
claimed that there is no loss of consortium when the
partner is seriously injured. Mesothelioma victim Bill
McKnight and his registered domestic partner, Steve
Parsons, will be allowed to proceed with the loss of
consortium element of their lawsuit against the defendants
responsible for Bill's asbestos poisoning. "It was
the right ruling," said attorney Roger Worthington.
"We're pleased with this fair result."