In Their Words – 2006
Patients share their Dana-Farber experience
President Edward J. Benz Jr., M.D.
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
10 Brookline Place West, 6th Floor
Brookline, MA 02445-7226
Dear Dr. Benz:
Over the past several months my dear wife, Elaine, was a Dana-Farber patient fighting advanced metastatic colon cancer. Her body succumbed to the disease on Dec. 15, 2005.
As terrible as it was for her to be battling the horrible scourge of cancer, this experience brought us into close contact with an absolutely wonderful group of people who work for you. After all our visits to Dana-Farber and being exposed to your team, we now consider many of your fellow employees our "extended family."
Dana-Farber has a reputation for cutting edge research, treatment, and technology, but as I am sure you are well aware, the people who take care of us are the reason you are the BEST. We would like to commend the following Dana-Farber employees who we feel represent the standards of excellence in cancer patient care that your institution is known for: Dr. Peter Enzinger, Dr. J. Paul Marcoux, Dr. Lida Nabati, Mary Rapp, Colleen Lawrence, Deborah Diprete, Christine Lilienfeld, Patricia Rizzo, Maureen Kelly, Peter Zumpfe, Amy Rios, Mayesha Shavers and Dyana Guarino. In addition, we were fortunate to receive the care of social work interns Bryan Harter and Molly Steinberg who have made a most favorable differences in our lives. You should hire them both!
This group, and several others who we never knew by name, afforded us top notch professional care and exhibited a genuine sense of caring that is priceless. God bless them for their loving attitude, crucial work and giving us hope.
Please extend our most sincere appreciation to your outstanding team for offering us their best efforts. They have truly made a positive difference in our lives.
For Elaine and our family,
Bob Ruda
