In the last months of her life, Aruna Gambhir, widow of a long-time Stanford Medicine professor, reached out to our team with a request. Gambhir and her family had been plagued by cancer for decades. She was the last survivor of her immediate family, having lost her husband and son to the disease, and she was battling cancer for the third time. She asked us to write a story that captured the tumult, devastation, and inextinguishable hope that she carried with her. While Gambhir wanted to tell the story of her family, she also wanted to relay the impact of deep investment and the use of cutting-edge technology to battle cancer. That desire was, in part, ignited when her husband’s former colleague visited her in the hospital and shared an update; the former colleague had been studying cells from Gambhir’s son’s tumor, and after years of research, the team had made remarkable advances in the understanding of gliomas, the brain cancer that ended Gambhir’s son’s life. Gambhir’s strength and commitment to moving the field of cancer research forward—as she herself was a leader in cancer diagnostic technology—had never wavered. She relayed to writer Hanae Armitage that she hopes that the story of her family inspires strong investment and progress in the field.
From the Judges
A strong human-interest story that covers cancer and Gambhir in a thoughtful manner, while demonstrating the importance of medical research. Well written, it would be relevant and potentially comforting for many in ther alumni community.
