Event funds research grants for LSU Health
The 2015 Life Savers gala, “A Black Tie Affair,” will be held Aug. 29 at the Riverfront Ballroom at Sam’s Town Casino.
This annual dinner/dance formal event, complete with a silent auction, is part of a big fundraiser for the Feist-Weiller Cancer Center. These funds will help serve competitive cancer research grants at LSU Health.
Anne Higdon, director of development for Feist-Weiller Cancer Center, can’t wait for “A Black Tie Affair.”
“The Life Savers gala is always a fun party,” Higdon said. “This year is no exception, as they’ll feature two unique raffles.
The first raffle will feature 10 $500 shopping sprees to Lee Michaels Fine Jewelry with limited tickets available to participate. The second raffle is for Fork or Cork and offers guests the opportunity to draw a card that will have either a picture of a fork or a cork. The participant will then select a bottle of wine or draw from a bag of dinner certificates.
The gala will also feature a Tapsnap Photo area underwritten by Argent and quality musical entertainment by Musical Fantasy, who is based in Mobile, Ala.
“Musical Fantasy is great and have been here before when Life Savers was a masquerade ball,” Higdon said. “They’re so fun!” The goal for “A Black Tie Affair” to is to net more than $100,000 for the cause. Silent auction items include beautiful jewelry from Sid Potts, Max’s Pawn Shop and McCary’s, a vacation to Aspen to stay at the The Gant or the U.S. Virgin Islands, a masterpiece portrait of New York, fly-boarding lessons, football tickets, gardening opportunities, various shopping sprees and more.
“Seeing our community come together to support cancer research is what I’m most excited to see this year,” said Jodi Penn Rives, chairman for “A Black Tie Affair.” “Feist-Weiller is an amazing cancer research institute right here in our own backyard. The research and partnerships are remarkable.”
As chairman of A Black Tie Affair, Rives hopes to see their goals met and lives changed. “The money raised at this event will fund translational cancer research in which physicians and scientists take clinical problems from the bedside to the research laboratory, where solutions are generated that come back to the bedside,” Rives said. “This type of research allows the scientific discoveries to more rapidly become practical applications that can be used in assessment and treatment of cancer patients.”
The 2014 Life Savers fundraiser, chaired by Dr. Sherin, Matt Mercer, Dr. Ellie and Matt Hudnall, funded three $40,000 Idea Awards that provided LSU Health Shreveport faculty the means to develop ideas, so that they might successfully compete for grants nationally. This is a crucial element to the fundraiser, as research and finding a cure for cancer is what it’s all about.
This year’s winners include:
• Associate Professor of Biochemistry Dr. Gulshan Sunavala-Dossabhoy, for research on salivary glands impacted by radiation;
• Professor of Physiology Dr. J. Steven Alexander, for work on how obstruction of the gut lymphatic system, an important contributor to inflammation, changes the state of inflammation and how gut bacteria may contribute to these alterations; and
• Professor of Physiology Dr. Lynn Harrison, for research on how radiation’s effect on normal tissue can result in secondary tumors or other late effects such as cardiovascular disease.
Of the 31 local researchers who won Idea Grants, 58 percent went on to compete successfully for funding at the national level. That has turned $1.4 million of investment into $11.4 million.
For Rives, this fundraiser strikes on an incredibly personal level. Rives’ father was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1998 and died in 1999, while her mother was diagnosed with cancer in 2000 and is doing well. “There has been so much research with breast cancer and she’s done great,” Rives said. “Even lung cancer today has a longer life expectancy.”
“When a loved one or friend is diagnosed with cancer, the questions we ask are ‘Is there a cure? What is the treatment? Is there a clinical trial? What is the survival rate?
Am I going to live?’” Rives said. “I believe we have to be on the front lines of cancer research.”
But it’s hard when cancer strikes close to home, as it did with her husband.
“Just when Mike and I thought we’d be empty-nesters and begin a new chapter in our life, he was diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma – a rare and fastmoving adenocarcinoma,” Rives said.
“We had a fabulous Feist-Weiller-trained medical oncologist, Dr. Chad Hargon. He really made Mike’s last year count.”
Rives hopes everyone in the area will come out, have a good time and support the cause. “We have to give to cancer research and support cancer research before our loved one is diagnosed,” Rives said. “Be the reason there is a trial or research funded. Don’t want until it’s too late.”
– Betsy St. Amant
Want to Go?
For more information or for tickets, contact Higdon at 813-1423 or email [email protected].
