His family,wife Katie and teenage children Emily,Matthew and Lucy,sitting at a table in the audience,knew how much emotion was behind those words.
I was among many at the Arboretum and around the country judging by the way my phone lit up with messages who was brushing away a tear as Scolyer spoke.
The thousands of lives saved by Scolyer and Long’s team at Melanoma Institute Australia,where they are co-medical directors,happily included mine after a diagnosis of stage four melanoma out of the blue in 2019.
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What would have been a disease as terminal as Scolyer’s type of brain tumour,glioblastoma IDH wild-type,has become much more treatable in the past 15 years because of the institute’s trailblazing work with immunotherapy,which supercharges the body’s immune system to destroy cancer cells.
Now more than 50 per cent of patients with advanced melanoma,patients who come to the institute saying variations of Scolyer’s “I don’t want to die” to their oncologist,are effectively cured.
Grateful to be in that lucky category,I’ve seen how determined he is to stay alive for his family and his work,while I’ve been writing a book with him,Brainstorm,for publisher Allen&Unwin.