Oncologist speaks about recent advances in cancer research and detection

Many students’ lives have been or will one day be affected by cancer since one in every six Americans will be diagnosed with some form of it within their lifetime, according to oncologist Manish Bhandari.

Bhandari discussed the recent advances in cancer research and detection during his after school presentation in the Library Research Center on Nov. 6. This discussion was the first of what a new club hopes will be many upcoming speakers who will speak on a variety of subjects.

These speakers will be part of the Industry and Academia Connections Program, founded by sophomore Arnav Dugar.

“The purpose is to bring people from either industry or academia to school so we can introduce what is going on in the real world to students,” said Dugar.

Dugar has had this idea for over a year but finally put it into effect this year with the support of assistant principal Brian Safine.

“There are many things that we do learn in school that get outdated because as things progress, the textbooks are not able to keep up with it,” said Dugar. “This [program] is one way to get around this issue and show students what is really going on.”

The scientific world, in this case, cancer, is one example of how information is constantly changing. Bhandari spoke on how the cure for cancer must be found in a series of smaller steps over a long period of time.

This talk, which was attended by 17 students, covered the progress of cancer research and where it could lead to in the future.

“I was surprised that [the talk] was actually pretty interesting,” said sophomore Sophia Raggett. “It was really cool that [Bhandari] was an actual practitioner and gave us a lot of in depth knowledge about what he actually does and different treatments.”

Dugar has already contacted possible future speakers who may speak about topics such as 3D television and flip phones. He hopes that they will be as successful as the first and more students will attend.

“I’ve already seen that there are a lot of people who are interested in coming to high schools and speaking to students,” said Dugar. “There’s such a wealth of knowledge out there that I don’t think we’ll run out of speakers.”