Sep 25, 2020
International business leader Riccardo Braglia has experienced great loss from cancer. But the perspective he gained inspires what he gives to help patients everywhere. Riccardo shares his story with ASCO CEO Cliff Hudis, MD, FACP, FASCO.
TRANSCRIPT
PRESENTER 1: When cancer took the life of his best friend, Riccardo Braglia redirected the focus of his international health company to improving treatment for patients with cancer. Then cancer took his mom. Inspired by his mother and the many loved ones he's lost to cancer, he is now a major contributor to cancer research. In this episode of Your Stories, Riccardo talks to his friend and ASCO and Conquer Cancer CEO, Dr. Clifford Hudis, about coping with loss, embracing life's special moments, and what he sees as the future of cancer care.
DR. HUDIS: So Ricardo, we all come to where we are in life from
very diverse paths and backgrounds, and we're curious about your
childhood, especially given that you grew up in Europe. Can you
tell us a little bit about what it was like when you grew up and
how that relates to where we are today?
RICCARDO BRAGLIA: Yeah, I grew up in Italy in a small village in
the countryside of Milan, and my family has been always involved in
the pharmaceutical area because my grandfather started these
activities after the war. And so that was part of my DNA.
I remember since I was 14, during the summertime, my father said,
you cannot do more than two weeks of holidays. The rest should be
working in the company. So I started doing warehousing and moving
stuff, and then when I was 16, helping to produce tablets, and then
when I was 18, going into the labs to understand some chemical
things. And then I went to the university, and then my family
decided to sell the Italian company. We got to Switzerland, and
there was a start up again. And my father and a couple of other
friends started a company from scratch in the 70s, and then I was
involved in that.
Then I will into oncology. That is, what is today my company, but
also my focus of life was mainly due to two major events. One was
the death of my best friend. He died by multiple myeloma. I was
shocked not just by the death but by the side effects of the
chemotherapy and by all this stuff that is linked to the illness
itself and to the therapy. So I refocused my company from
anti-inflammatory, and gastrointestinal, and antibody area to
oncology.
And the second one has being that my family, unfortunately, is a
family that die of cancer. My grandmother, my grandfather, my
mother, my two uncle, my aunts, and unfortunately, now my last aunt
also has a very bad pancreatic cancer. So my family has definitely
been affected by this terrible disease.
DR. HUDIS: Now, I know your mother's death was a particularly
difficult one for you, and I'm curious if you can talk a little bit
about your relationship with your mother, how close you felt to
her.
RICCARDO BRAGLIA: I'm the older boy of a family of two sons, and of
course, Mom is Mom. And my father, being an entrepreneur, was
always out of the house, especially when I was young, so all my
values and education was really linked to my mom. I then went to
school, then to university, then starting business, and then
creating my family. I married, two sons, too. And of course, the
relationship with my mom was a little bit more away. I see her on
weekends or on holidays, not in daily life like when you're a kid,
which is normal for any families.
Then what happened-- unfortunately, four years ago she get ovarian
cancer, and then immediately diagnosed with multiple metastases
almost everywhere in her body and was immediately going into
palliative care. And she died four months after, but in these four
months I dedicated to my mom every single day, in the morning, in
the evening, at lunchtime and really recreated this feeling that we
had when I was a child.
And this relationship really evolved back again, and we have some
very good moments in the morning, waking her up, and trying to get
out of the bed, and also spending time, and praying together, and
creating our faith again. So in the bad news that she passed away,
the good news is that she inspired me to do what I'm doing every
day. I'm fighting against cancer.
DR. HUDIS: Every family that experiences cancer probably
experiences it in some uniquely different way, different ages,
different family members, different kinds of cancer, different
journeys, and you've described a bit of that journey. I wonder if
there's any aspect of this that you would talk about in terms of
the broader impact on your family, not just on you but on your
siblings and the other generations around your mother.
RICCARDO BRAGLIA: The first reaction was, we don't have the
illness. My mother will survive. Even though it was very clear
there was no chance, that was the first reaction. And then the
situation was that the family get back together and we trying to
create a kind of team to support my mother and my father. So it was
a kind of group getting together, and even my two sons at the time
were at university, they spent a lot of time coming back and
supporting my mom, and staying with her, and talking with her. So
it's creating a kind of defense unit around this kind of thing,
which I think was a good approach, and everybody was involved a
little bit on supporting and creating a team around that.
DR. HUDIS: So it sounds to me, from what you describe, that in some
cases a strong family can be both made stronger and have a positive
response, but I imagine for many families this is a much bigger
stress if they don't have a foundation of strength and
connectedness.
RICCARDO BRAGLIA: If you have not a good family background or
family strength, that could be a challenge, and especially if you
have a family which lives very far away, this could be a very big
stress. You need people that give you love and support you through
this journey. What I consider very important is to have faith,
which doesn't mean to have faith in one specific religion but to
have more faith on a spiritual point of view, which helps you to
face everyday steps. If you don't have a strong family or a family
close by, identify maybe a couple of good friends that could
support you through this journey.
DR. HUDIS: I'm curious as a donor, how do you measure that return
on investment?
RICCARDO BRAGLIA: Of course, research is a difficult field to have
immediately a return on investment, but if you select promising,
high-quality researcher [INAUDIBLE] great ideas, this is a really
wide possibility of return and having good result. So identifying
the best people, and monitor their career, and following their
career is probably the best way to have results.
DR. HUDIS: As a supporter philanthropically of research, surely you
must have a vision about where you think our field should be
headed. What do you think cancer care should look like five years,
10 years, 20 years from now?
RICCARDO BRAGLIA: I think that we have to put the patients in the
focus. We have to invest in making, hopefully, one day the
cancer-free for every cancer, but in the meanwhile, trying to
extend the life of these patients in order that the cancer became
more a chronic disease. The second point, I think, is to be focused
on quality of life of the patients because sometimes we just get
new treatment. We extend maybe one month, two months, or three
months the life of patients but with a very terrible quality of
life.
So when my mother got ill, whatever months or weeks she will live,
to do it as the best as possible, without pain, trying to have good
food, waking up, moving a little bit, makeup, and looking nicer
because these are small things that throughout the journey of
cancer is very important to leave better and to live in good
quality. Then if you succeed to be a survivor, it means that you
fight the cancer and you get a solution. That is the best things.
But if you can't, you have to remember only the quality of life of
what you are doing because I think the daily life is made by small
things, and these are something that is very helpful through this
journey.
DR. HUDIS: That's actually profound, that daily life is made by
small things. I'm going to remember that. It was a pleasure talking
to you, Riccardo.
RICCARDO BRAGLIA: Thanks a lot. It was a pleasure.
PRESENTER 1: Donors like Ricardo provide the foundation of which
breakthroughs, both big and small, are built. You can learn more
about the latest cancer research at conquer.org. Hearing the
experiences of others can help people cope with the challenges
cancer brings. Help others find these inspiring stories by leaving
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Play to hear every new episode. Thanks for listening to Your
Stories-- Conquering Cancer.
PRESENTER 2: The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to
inform. This is not a substitute for professional medical care and
is not intended for use in the diagnosis or treatment of individual
conditions. Guests on this podcast express their own opinions,
experience, and conclusions. The mention of any product, service,
organization, activity, or therapy should not be construed as an
ASCO endorsement.