Ovester Grays, athletic director and head women’s basketball coach at Hillside High School in Durham, North Carolina, was diagnosed with mantle cell lymphoma in 2019. Through his nine months of treatment, his entire care team at Duke reassured him. “I was confident about the facts, but the emotional and the mental was nurtured every single step of the way. And it changed my life,” he said. “I’ve told my family if I’m every seriously sick, take me to Duke Hospital. They’re some of the best trained medical treatment personnel in the world. So they mean the world to me.”
Life-Changing Treatment
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Watch Coach Grays Share His Story
In honor of Duke Cancer’s 50th anniversary, blood cancer survivor Coach Ovester Grays and DCI Executive Director Michael Kastan, MD, PhD, share their hope for the future.Written By
Angela Spivey
Duke University School of Medicine
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Five DCI Members Receive V Foundation Awards
Five Duke Cancer Institute members received funding awards this year from the V Foundation for Cancer Research. The foundation funds game-changing research and all-star scientists to accelerate Victory Over Cancer® and save lives.The DCI members who received awards this year are:Alicia Darnell, PhDFunded with support from Hockey Fights Cancer powered by the V Foundation presented by AstraZenecaProject: "Stalling cancer at the ribosome"John Hickey, PhDProject: "High-Throughput Phenotypic Mapping of T Cells to Engineer More Effective Cancer Therapies"Corinne Linardic, MD, PhDFunded by the Dick Vitale Pediatric Cancer Research FundProject: "Identification and targeting of essential regions of driver fusion oncoproteins in rhabdomyosarcoma"Jessica Sun, MDFunded in partnership with the Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation through the 2024 Dribble for VictoryProject: "Expanding Clinical Trial Access for Pediatric and Young Adult Oncology Patients at the Duke Cancer Institute"Kris Wood, PhDFunded by the Orr Family FoundationProject: "Eradicating residual non-small cell lung cancers by targeting their PKN2-dependent survival"Learn more about the V Foundation.
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Five DCI Members Receive V Foundation Awards
Five Duke Cancer Institute members received funding awards this year from the V Foundation for Cancer Research. The foundation funds game-changing research and all-star scientists to accelerate Victory Over Cancer® and save lives.The DCI members who received awards this year are:Alicia Darnell, PhDFunded with support from Hockey Fights Cancer powered by the V Foundation presented by AstraZenecaProject: "Stalling cancer at the ribosome"John Hickey, PhDProject: "High-Throughput Phenotypic Mapping of T Cells to Engineer More Effective Cancer Therapies"Corinne Linardic, MD, PhDFunded by the Dick Vitale Pediatric Cancer Research FundProject: "Identification and targeting of essential regions of driver fusion oncoproteins in rhabdomyosarcoma"Jessica Sun, MDFunded in partnership with the Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation through the 2024 Dribble for VictoryProject: "Expanding Clinical Trial Access for Pediatric and Young Adult Oncology Patients at the Duke Cancer Institute"Kris Wood, PhDFunded by the Orr Family FoundationProject: "Eradicating residual non-small cell lung cancers by targeting their PKN2-dependent survival"Learn more about the V Foundation.
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This page was reviewed
on 10/16/2023