Karl teams up with Swedish Medical Center in cancer fight

With the same passion that he brings to an NBA huddle, George Karl stood on the patio of a Denver-area home and shared a few words of encouragement and inspiration.

He wasn’t just representing himself as the head coach of the Denver Nuggets. He was representing himself as a two-time cancer survivor who wants to improve the treatment and recovery process for current and future cancer patients.

In conjunction with the Progressive Health Center at Swedish Medical Center, Karl and his life partner Kim Van Deraa are helping to raise money and awareness for the Cancer Care Initiative.

The Cancer Care Initiative is a non-profit effort designed to provide patients with a comprehensive treatment plan that balances traditional treatment methods such as radiation and chemotherapy with integrative methods such as acupuncture, meditation and yoga. Integrative methods typically are not covered by insurance.

“I think there are nutritional people who are being ignored and people that have the holistic approach who are being ignored,” Karl said. “It’s crazy that I can take the most powerful pain drugs and go to the pharmacy every week and not get charged one dollar. Yet I can’t go get a massage without paying out of my pocket. It’s ludicrous.”

Diagnosed with head and neck cancer in January 2010, Karl was treated at Swedish Medical Center during his grueling radiation and chemotherapy sessions. As the recovery process went along, he became more familiar with the options available, and he hired a nutritionist and immunologist.

“I’ve been tremendously educated by the process,” Karl said “I’d like to be a part of bringing more people together and I’m committed to bringing a more humanistic and compassionate way of treating our cancer patients.”

Rob Edmisson, who was treated for the same cancer as Karl in 2008, said he found comfort in acupuncture. The treatment helped mitigate the dry-mouth symptoms that forced him to drink a bottle of water every hour.

“It affects your life because you can’t get through the night,” Edmisson said.

He also thought he was going to have to give up working the first-down chains at Broncos games because “there’s nowhere to go to the bathroom in front of 80,000 people.”

During a game between the Raiders and Broncos, he half-jokingly told an Oakland official that they needed to start running the ball so he could go home.

Edmisson’s case is a good example of how integrative medicine can help cancer patients in their recovery, and Karl is trying to help the Cancer Care Initiative provide education and access to a wide range of treatment options.

“George can be such an incredible spokesperson for integrative medicine because it’s just evolving,” said Progressive Health Center chief executive officer Sue Goodin. “People are just starting to understand what it is. With integrative medicine, you have a team, just like he has a team.”

Goodin’s goal is to raise $1 million over the next several months for the Cancer Care Initiative, which was founded earlier this year by doctors, nurses, dietitians, social workers, integrative medicine experts, health care administrators and community members.

The group believes in educating cancer patients and their families. Their mission is to provide a road map that outlines all treatment and recovery options as they face a challenge that can seem overwhelming, if not impossible.

“We have tremendously talented people in the medical profession, but it sometimes reminds me of my basketball team,” Karl said. “They have big egos, they make a lot of money and they like to protect their territory to a fault to where being a good teammate sometimes doesn’t happen.

“It’s a situation where you have so many people involved – insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, holistic medicine, nutritionists, navigators. It will come together in time. The thing that always bothered me is some of these brilliant people … sometimes I wish they were all on the same team all the time every day.”

As a means to that end, Karl recently presented Progressive Health Center with a $50,000 check and encouraged others to join him as a dedicated member of his “Coach’s Corner,” a club that would meet periodically to talk basketball and raise money for the Cancer Care Initiative.

“We’re picking up momentum,” said Dr. Lilly Klancar, an oncologist who worked with Karl during his cancer treatment at Swedish. “He has given us the momentum and awareness. You need somebody people will listen to.”

Since his diagnosis and treatment for prostate cancer in 2005 and head and neck cancer in 2010, Karl has been a leading advocate for cancer research.

He is actively involved with the American Cancer Society, the Cancer League of Colorado and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tenn.

St. Jude, which provides treatment to children regardless of their family’s ability to pay, created the George Karl Award for Courage in Sports last year. Earlier this month, Karl proudly presented the 2011 award to Hall of Fame coach Dr. Jack Ramsay, who is recovering from treatment for cancer in his brain.

Ramsay, 86, beat prostate cancer in 2000 and was diagnosed with cancer in his foot in 2004.

“Everybody wants to say I’ve gone through hell. This man has really gone through hell with his cancer,” Karl said. “The man has a power and desire to live maybe greater than any man I’ve been around. And he was a helluva a coach. He always served the game with a dignity and honesty that was fun to be around.”

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