My younger brother, Dr. Ron Davis, was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer last February and passed away nine months later. Ron was diagnosed while president of the AMA. Ron was a preventative health specialist and worked for years for the Center for Disease Control's Office on Smoking and Health under Dr. Everett Koop and later, for the Ford Health System in Detroit.
Today, I am in Washington D.C., preparing with my wife Deborah, to participate in the third annual PanCan Advocacy Day (tomorrow). Our "team" will meet the Florida senators (Mel Martinez and Bill Nelson) as well as our congressional representative Ron Klein. In addition, we will meet with a few other reps and for those we don't have scheduled meetings, we will drop off a packet of information about this disease.
There are two things we are asking of these elected officials:
- To co-sponsor the Pancreatic Cancer Research and Education Act, and
- To double the budget for the NCI over the next five years ($6B for FY10)
Here are a few facts about Pancreatic Cancer
- It's the fourth leading cause of cancer-related death
- There are currently no early-detection tools (usually, by the time you find out you have it, it's at stage 4)
- 75% of Americans diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer die within the first year.
For more information, you can see my Team Ron page and also the PanCan site and Advocacy Day pages.