LOS ANGELES, Sept. 6, 2011 — The Pacific Meso Center (PMC) is pleased to announce and recognize generous donations from the law offices of Roger G. Worthington PC in San Pedro, California and The Asbestos Legal Center in San Francisco, California.
PMC is part of The Pacific Heart, Lung & Blood Institute (PHLBI), a 501(c)(3) non-profit medical research institute, and serves as PHLBI's comprehensive research and support center for malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM), an asbestos-induced cancer. Currently, MPM has no known cure and very few effective treatment options. PMC's programs are focused on supportive patient care and the discovery and development of novel treatments for MPM.
Adding to his extensive philanthropic legacy, Roger Worthington, a leading attorney passionately representing mesothelioma victims, increased his PMC donation total to $275,000 this year alone.
"I am pleased to continue my support of research into new ways of combating this deadly disease," said Worthington, who has been representing meso patients since 1988. "Since vital government research dollars from the NIH and the Department of Defense have yet to materialize, and since the asbestos industry has failed to acknowledge let alone clean up their mess, now more than ever I'm urging my trial bar colleagues to join me and show their true concern for the welfare of their clients by supporting research in a meaningful way. We have a responsibility to work with our clients in the effort to fund medical research. "
The Asbestos Legal Center in San Francisco also recently decided to join together with PMC in support of their clients' medical well-being, committing $500,000 over three years to PMC research. The Asbestos Legal Center is particularly concerned with the needs of U.S. service veterans, and a portion of the research support will underwrite basic science research within the Greater Los Angeles VA Healthcare System.
"The Asbestos Legal Center has stalwartly represented mesothelioma victims and their families for years and is particularly honored to support the Pacific Meso Center's cutting-edge mesothelioma research," said Michael J. Mandelbrot, founding attorney. "PMC's program, insight, and priorities, as developed by scientific advisor Dr. Robert Cameron, are, without a doubt, the most ingenious, exciting, and promising research activities perhaps anywhere in the world."
Dr. Robert B. Cameron is the director of the Comprehensive Mesothelioma Program of the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, the Chief of Thoracic Surgery at the West Los Angeles Veterans' Administration Medical Center, and the first to propose and develop treatments designed to manage MPM as a chronic treatable disease, similar to diabetes and high blood pressure. Dr. Cameron, who recently chaired the 1st International Symposium on Lung-Sparing Therapies for Malignant Pleural Mesothelioma, also has been a long-time champion of a meticulous lung-sparing pleurectomy/decortication surgical procedure, which, as discussed at the Symposium, was shown by the U.K.'s Mesothelioma and Radical Surgery (MARS) Trial to be far superior to the more radical extra-pleural pneumonectomy (EPP) lung-removing procedure aggressively promoted in Boston and New York.
For further information, contact Clare Cameron at PMC: 310-478-4678.
http://www.pacificmesocenter.org
# # #