We are country that sadly has millions upon millions of current and future patients to care for. Families that for now and decades to come will rely on the hope of healing that only goes from dream to reality through research. I have dedicated most of my career to supporting researchers in their mission to innovate us towards a better tomorrow.
Over the years, I have worked with a lot of researchers, and I'm always surprised by how thankless and tireless the work is. It involves thousands of hours in labs, reading, publishing, failing and getting up again to repeat with a goal of the next discovery that will change patient care and patient outcomes. Progress is slow and painstaking and it requires deep commitment and serious, relentless effort.
The infrastructure of research is built with the hard work and dedication of these creative, fearless pioneers and tomorrow thinkers. These are fighters in a battle of health that has the potential to inflict pain and suffering on any one of us or our loved ones, at any time. These are, for the most part, exceptional people, doing extraordinary things.
Without research we wouldn’t have treatments for chronic illness, cancer patients wouldn’t have therapies which in some cases can add years to their lives, we couldn't save lives by transplanting organs and see NICU babies grow up and graduate high school. Doctors could not heal or treat the way they do without years and years of research done by very smart, very dedicated people.
In a time where disease seems to be a matter of when not if, and families are enduring crushing diagnoses for the young, old and everything in between, research offers hope. And hope is everything when you face an illness that has no cure. I will never forget the sound my mother made when she was told she had weeks to live; facing the reality that there was no treatment, no trial, no drug. Only the end, it has haunted me for 2 decades. My mom may have been just one person, but, every patient is just one person, and one person, 2 million times.....is a lot of lives counting on the possibilities research provides.
Without research, we would not be the designers of destiny; we would be the victims it. Research is simply put, essential for humans to not just survive, but thrive!
So, to all those researchers, & people who have devoted their lives to this incredible work, you are amazing. I am proud that research has been a vital thread in our shared ambition as humans, and hope that the healing of patients, present and future, will continue to be a persistent, aggressive, essential and unwavering priority for us all.
Comentários