Beverly Levy Walk and Block Party Highlights Value of Cancer Research

At the start of the Beverly Levy Walk and Block Party on May 4 at the Orange Fairgrounds, an annual event to raise money for gynecologic cancer research, a few dozen women, all dressed in teal, gathered for a photo.

What makes this photo unique is that everyone in it is a cancer survivor. And none of them would have been there without the important scientific research that happens in places like Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center. This year’s walk, in which hundreds of people participated despite threatening skies, raised $300,000 to support that research.

“You have no idea what a profound difference that kind of money makes,” says U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn, and herself a cancer survivor. She recalled how, 39 years ago, she received the news from her doctor that she had ovarian cancer.

“I know all of us have this shared experience of understanding the diagnosis but not understanding it when we’re told. We can’t believe we are listening to the words of a physician who says, ‘You may have ovarian cancer. You may have cervical cancer.’ We all know what that feeling is like.”

She says the vital research being done at Yale and elsewhere must continue.

“There is nothing more important for our government to be doing than provide the dollars for the research that saves people’s lives,” says DeLauro to cheers. “We’re not going to cut research funding. We are going to support those agencies that support our health.”

Ian Krop, MD, PhD professor of medicine (medical oncology and hematology), says that when his career began 25 years ago, the only treatment for ovarian cancer was chemotherapy. It was effective but there were serious side effects and, over time, cancers could develop resistance. So about 10 years ago, researchers, including Elena Ratner MD, MBA, professor of obstetrics, gynecology & reproductive sciences, started to identify abnormalities in cancer cells that cause certain behaviors, he says.

“One of the things (they) found was that some ovarian cancers have problems repairing their DNA and use a backup pathway to repair their DNA,” Krop says. “That led to the idea of developing drugs that block this backup system so the cancers will have no way of repairing their DNA and could die. That led to the development of a group of drugs called PARP inhibitors. It’s been shown in clinical trials that these PARP inhibitors are very effective in patients who have these DNA-repair-defective ovarian cancers.”

Researchers are also developing a drug that takes potent chemotherapy and links it to an antibody that has the ability to find cancer cells anywhere in the body. “It acts kind of like a guided missile, bringing these chemotherapies right to the cancer cell, sparing normal tissue from damage so they have less side effects.”

Krop says there are currently over 260 clinical trials underway at Smilow Cancer Hospital and that this research must continue because “there’s tremendous progress being made, and the pace of discovery is so much faster than it ever was.”

Hugh Taylor, MD, Anita O'Keeffe Young Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences and professor of molecular, cellular, and developmental biology, said Yale researchers are on the verge of life-changing breakthroughs in cancer treatment.

“It’s important that we let that work continue,” he said. Taylor was also among several speakers who recalled the late Peter E. Schwartz, MD, longtime Yale Ob/Gyn and Cancer Center faculty member, leader, and innovator.

After the welcoming speeches, several hundred walkers circled the fairgrounds for about 45 minutes, many of them in teams supporting cancer survivors. The event also featured informational booths set up across the Green, including several from Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital highlighting cancer genetic counseling, cancer screening, clinical trials, and supportive care, to name a few. The Yale New Haven Hospital mobile mammography van was also on hand.