Susanna Fletcher Greer, Chief Scientific Officer of the V Foundation, shared Charles Hong’s post on LinkedIn, adding:
“Stories like this beautiful one stay with me.
What looks like a miracle is often the result of something quieter and much slower. Years of researchers asking basic questions about how cancer works. How tumors repair DNA. How the immune system recognizes what does not belong. Why some cancers respond when others do not.
The decision to use immunotherapy here was not luck. It was built on decades of research into DNA damage response, tumor mutation burden, and immune biology.
When patients run out of standard options, those discoveries become possibilities.
Progress against cancer doesn’t happen all at once. It happens because someone funded the research long before a patient needed it.
This is what science in action really looks like. Thank you for sharing Charles Hong, MD, PhD and big hugs to your sweet friend.”
Quoting Charles Hong, Chair of Medicine at Michigan State University, on X:
“I am reminded once again that research matters.
My wife’s friend was diagnosed with metastatic ovarian cancer, resistant to our favorite drug Cis/Carboplatin. Genetic testing revealed, among other things, KRAS G12A mutation. She was started on a KRAS inhibitor but unfortunately developed massive myopathy to the point she could barely walk. At that point, she needed bilateral nephrostomy tubes for renal blockage and was given weeks to live. But her mutation panel had also revealed modestly elevated tumor mutation burden & CHEK2 mutation, which is involved in DNA damage response. Based on this (though the evidence was limited), she was started on immune checkpoint blockade as a last-ditch effort. Since then, her tumors have melted away, and our friend is now strong enough to clear the snow during last night’s blizzard in Northeast. Below is a photo she just sent us.
I share not just because this is a miracle, but a Science In Action!”
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