Caring Relationships - Gundersen Health System

Betty and Jon Kabara take the podium to announce the creation of the Kabara
Cancer Research Institute.
research efforts to a new level.”
The Kabaras look forward to the work of the Institute
getting underway with the arrival of renowned cancer
researcher Dr. Carl Simon Shelley (see inset.) After a
lifetime dedicated to finding a cure, Jon Kabara will be
more than happy to make good on his childhood promise.
As Betty Kabara says, “We’re at the point in our lives
where we feel time is running out, so we’ve got to get
somebody else to carry on.” By establishing the Cancer
Research Institute at Gundersen Lutheran, the Kabaras
are symbolically passing the torch and entrusting their
dream to a world-class medical center equally dedicated
to their cause.
The Kabaras
had not received
medical care at
Gundersen Lutheran prior to making their generous gift
to the Foundation. That changed in June of 2008, when
Dr. Kabara was treated for a serious heart condition that
threatened his life. Told by his regular cardiologists that
he had only six months to live, the Kabaras sought a
second opinion from Umang Patel, MD, and Julio Bird, MD,
at the Gundersen Lutheran Heart Institute. Dr. Kabara
now credits both of his physicians—and every caregiver
he has encountered at Gundersen Lutheran—with
giving him a second life. “It is such an incredible place,”
observes Betty Kabara. “The service, the care, the way
we were treated before, during and after Jon’s surgery…
we just couldn’t get over it. If we were younger, we
would move here for this hospital.” Jon Kabara is equally
grateful. “As patients, the greatest thing we received
One of the scientists who will
be conducting research in
the Dr. Jon and Betty Kabara
Cancer Research Institute is
Carl Simon Shelley, DPhil. Dr.
Shelley received his doctorate
at the University of Oxford, and
arrived at Gundersen Lutheran
Carl Simon Shelley, DPhil
in early October, after spending
more than 20 years as a researcher at Harvard Medical
School. He has served as a visiting scientist at the
University of Paris, France, and has participated in
numerous national and international collaborations.
William A. Agger, MD, Director of Research for
Gundersen Lutheran Medical Foundation, couldn’t be
more pleased that the hiring of the organization’s first
dedicated senior scientist in the area of cancer research
coincided so closely with the Kabara’s initiative to
fund a Cancer Research Institute. “It’s just perfect
timing,” says Dr. Agger. Up to this point, the majority
of research conducted at Gundersen Lutheran has
been clinically based—meaning a doctor or nurse
chooses to investigate the cause of something they
see in their practice by looking at medical records or
conducting tests. The research Dr. Shelley conducts
is basic research, which is research at the molecular
or microbiology level. “Our program has grown to the
point where this is possible,” notes Dr. Agger, “thanks
to the foresight of those who came before us.”
The Kabaras (pictured above with Philip Shumacher, CFRE, left, and Mark
Connelly, MD, right)
here was hope. As donors, it reaffirmed that we were
doing the right thing. We’re putting our money in the
right place.”
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