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Reprinted with permission from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Bronze statue depicting Dr. Sidney Farber and “Jimmy” (2013)
Jimmy Returns In May 1998, Einar Gustafson returned to Boston to help Dana-Farber celebrate the 50th anniversary of the original Jimmy Fund radio broadcast. Einar had been the star of that broadcast, but Sidney Farber had chosen to call him Jimmy, partly to protect Einar’s privacy and partly to make him a generic poster child, representing all childhood cancer patients. In New England, “Jimmy” was a nickname synonymous with “the boy next door” (6). Whether through Farber’s treatments at the Clinic, spontaneous remission, or both, Einar survived his Burkitt’s lymphoma. Farber kept in touch with his young patient, and Einar’s family made modest donations to the Jimmy Fund every year. But Einar had returned to a quiet life in Maine (3). The 62-year-old grandfather of six made no secret that he was Jimmy, but he was inherently modest and spent his time raising three daughters and running his trucking business. When his sister contacted DanaFarber in 1998 to reconnect the Institute with Jimmy, Einar was more relieved than annoyed. He willingly re-entered the spotlight and represented Dana-Farber in a series of personal appearances as the nowgrownup Jimmy (3, 4, 6).
With elucidation of the human genome, the discovery of oncogenes, and most recently the immunotherapy approach, scientists and clinicians continue to make progress, and Dana-Farber remains at the forefront of cancer research, therapeutics, and prevention. Sidney Farber’s philosophy of translational medicine and total patient care has now been widely adopted, and NCI’s network of Comprehensive Cancer Centers ensures that laboratory discoveries move seamlessly to the clinic as innovative treatment and supportive care for all cancer patients. Curing cancer was always Sidney Farber’s goal. Although he could not claim victory, in his lifetime and largely through his efforts, acute childhood leukemia, Wilms’ tumor, Hodgkin’s disease, choriocarcinoma, and metastatic breast cancer went from incurable to diseases with dramatically high survival rates. And methotrexate, the compound that emerged from his original folic acid antagonist research more than 60 years ago, remains a mainstay (now often coupled with leucovorin rescue) of combination chemotherapy regimens as well as a treatment for autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and psoriasis. Methotrexate also remains on the World Health Organization’s Model List of Essential Medicines.
Reprinted from The Pharmacologist • December 2015