ALUMNI HONORS
THE HEALER : Brian Druker works to save those living with cancer .
You could call Brian Druker ’ 77 , MD ’ 81 , determined , committed , tireless — but what does he say of himself ? “ All of that is really just a healthy genetic dose of stubbornness from my parents .”
Whatever you call it , it was the drive that kept him pushing through research and development of Gleevec , a wondrous treatment for leukemia that has saved hundreds of thousands of lives . Inspired by the memory of his patients who succumbed to the disease , and making good on the promises he made them and their families , Druker brought the treatment from bench to bedside and has kept going strong in his role as a physician-scientist at Oregon Health & Science University and Director of the OHSU Knight Cancer Institute .
On choosing UC San Diego : “ UCSD has an incredible history — what they did by bringing in so many high-profile scientists and faculty to build the school , it created just an incredible learning environment . And so here I was at a relatively small school on a steep upward trajectory , and when I think back about the professors and the classes , the access that I had , it was remarkable . I couldn ’ t have made a better choice .”
On a prescient term paper : “ In my first year of medical school at UCSD , I took an elective class called ‘ The History of Chemotherapy ’. And I recall sitting in that class thinking that even though it was remarkable you could cure leukemia with four different chemotherapy drugs , it still seemed like such a barbaric and toxic process that there just had to be a better way . And the last line I wrote in a final for that class was , ‘ Only through the understanding of what distinguishes cancer cells from normal cells can we attack it more effectively .’ I didn ’ t know if that would be possible in my lifetime , but it clearly rings true in terms of what I ended up doing . To think that in my very first year of medical school , that class really laid the foundation for what I did with my career .”
On leading drug development that has saved hundreds of thousands of lives : “ You know , you don ’ t dwell on it . The reality is there ’ s still way more work to be done , and there ’ s still too many people dying of cancer — 600,000 people will die from cancer in the United States this year . We ’ ve improved the situation for one particular type of leukemia , and we ’ ve launched a new paradigm for how we can attack cancer , but there ’ s still work to be done . I think I ’ ve put an important piece of the puzzle into place , but there are still a lot of puzzle pieces left to put together .”
On putting together the rest of those pieces : “ I have three current projects : one is finding a way from a durable , stable , remission of leukemia to a cure so we can get patients off treatment . The second is tackling a much more difficult leukemia called acute-myeloid leukemia , a far more complicated cancer that will likely require combinations of treatment . And the third area of work is how to detect cancer at an earlier , more curable stage , when it ’ s less complicated . So we ’ re putting significant emphasis and effort into precisely detecting cancer at an earlier stage .”
Brian Druker talks more about his research and shares memories of campus at tritonmag . com / druker
59 TRITON | SPRING 2017