Mark E. Nesbit, Jr., M.D. Receives Relentless for a Cure Award
June 24, 2008 – The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s 2nd Annual Relentless for a Cure Award was presented to Mark E. Nesbit, Jr., M.D. at the LLS 2008 Man & Woman of the Year Gala, June 13. This award is given to an outstanding Minnesota medical professional whose research, diagnosis and/or treatment has contributed to improved quality of life for patients and their families and/or great advancements in the field of lymphoma or blood cancers. Dr. Nesbit has been involved with Children's Cancer Research Fund since its earliest days. He currently serves as a Chief Medical Advisor Emeritus on the Children's Cancer Research Fund Board of Directors.
Dr. Nesbit, the former head of the University of Minnesota’s Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Division, is well-regarded as an astute clinician, researcher, teacher and politician in his field. At the U of M, Dr. Nesbit was instrumental in developing that school’s pediatric hematology/oncology program – a program that led the nation in its three-year training requirement. Dr. Nesbit led several prominent national multidisciplinary studies for the treatment of various childhood malignancies. In the 1970s, he chaired the Children’s Cancer Group Study 101, which led to a long-term cure rate of more than 50 percent for the first time in any multiinstitutional study for childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia. He headed a study designed to investigate treatment results using chemotherapy versus bone marrow transplantation, and his research activities included long-term cancer survival and late effects.
Dr. Nesbit was the principal investigator of the Intergroup Ewings Sarcoma Study I and Study II that documented for the first time that adjuvant chemotherapy reduced local relapse rates as well as subsequent metastatic disease. He has also worked hard to provide for many other pediatric patients’ needs. Nesbit was instrumental in establishing the Ronald McDonald House of the Twin Cities and is a board member of the Make-a-Wish Foundation of America.
The Relentless for a Cure Committee, comprised of Minnesota medical professionals, selected
Dr. Nesbit from among a distinguished group of private and academic physicians/researchers who had been nominated by their peers and patients.