“I want to cure this cancer before I die or retire.”

studying the tumor at the time, and I've studied it for almost 25 years now.

What would you say your proudest accomplishment is both professionally and personally. Personally, I have a great family: my wife and our two daughters. Professionally, it hasn’t happened yet: I want to cure this cancer before I die or retire.

What might you say was the biggest challenge that you faced in your career? There’s a lot of ups and downs in careers, and it's hard to do a lot of different jobs. In my profession, obviously, sometimes patient care doesn't work out the way you want it to. It's hard to take care of patients. Things are not always in your control, and complications can occur. Maintaining research is very challenging because the funding is so low from the National Cancer Institute. So for instance, if 100 people submit a grant to the government, eight of them will get funded and the other 92 will get rejected. There's a lot of rejection in science, but careers are just like life: there are ups and downs, and you have to keep the long term goals in mind and try to weather the storms that come up now and then.

How did MKA prepare you for the path that your life has taken? It was a privilege to go to MKA. It was an incredible school. It was a small enough school that you could get to know everyone, and it was a big enough school that there were plenty of educational opportunities. Being the glutton for punishment that I am, I took four AP courses and that really prepared me well for the rest of my life. I entered college with the equivalent standing of a sophomore. So I only spent three years there. The rigor of the classes that I had at MKA made college easier.

What is the one piece of advice you would give to current MKA students? This kind of sounds corny, but it's important to tell people in high school that they really can do almost anything that they want, but they have to work hard and be committed to it. There are plenty of smart people in the world, but intelligence alone doesn't get you success. I trained at Penn for surgery, and it never crossed my mind that I would come back someday to be the chair of the department. This is the oldest department of surgery in the country. It was just purely through hard work and sacrifice.

WHAT IS A GASTROINTESTINAL STROMAL TUMOR (GIST)?

A gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST) is a type of cancer that begins in the digestive system. GISTs happen most often in the stomach and small intestine. A GIST is a growth of cells that's thought to form from a special type of nerve cells. These special nerve cells are in the walls of the digestive organs. They play a part in the process that moves food through the body.

Small GISTs may cause no symptoms, and they may grow so slowly that they don't cause problems at first. As a GIST grows, it can cause signs and symptoms. GISTs can happen in people at any age, but they are most common in adults. The cause of most GISTs isn't known.

WITH SO MANY MKA ALUMNI AROUND THE GLOBE, WE NEED YOUR HELP IN IDENTIFYING THOSE WHO ARE MAKING CHANGES IN THE WORLD.

WHO INSPIRES YOU?

CONTACT GRETCHEN BERRA: GBERRA@MKA.ORG