06/25/08 - Cancer Fight Rocks Capitol Hill

CHAPEL HILL -- Lisa L. White is continuing a battle that began with her son's fight.

The founder of Rock Against Cancer -- a nonprofit aimed at bringing music therapy to children with cancer -- took her work Tuesday from Chapel Hill to Capitol Hill. She was there to support the passage of the "Caroline Pryce Walker Conquer Childhood Cancer Act," which promises to significantly increase federal investment into childhood cancer research.

White noted that money funneling through the national cancer institute for children's oncology has been decreasing the last five years.

"It's been decreasing and clinical trials have been closing to kids which we as parents find unacceptable," White said by phone from Washington. "We're really optimistic that this 110th Congress gets it and realizes we need the supplemental money."

The bill authorizes $30 million annually in a five-year span, providing funding for pediatric cancer clinical trials research, a national childhood cancer database and improving public awareness regarding available treatment.

But her work did not necessarily begin with simply observing decreased funding and increasing incidents of childhood cancer.

She said it was born between the alliance of one survivor and one scientist.

Her inspiration is her 14-year-old son Gabriel Titus, who was diagnosed with childhood leukemia at 2 years old.

In September he will celebrate nine years off treatment. And he too has made the trip to Capitol Hill.

"It's interesting to have him in the room," White said. "He doesn't have much to say to them -- it's his presence."

His presence stands testament to the three years and two months of treatment he underwent, White tells them.

She will add that there is an 80-percent chance Gabe will live the rest of his life without any more incidents.

"It's meaningful for the senators to meet constituents rather than a representative from CureSearch," a national foundation with which she's also associated, White said. "After meeting young kids, it's kind of hard not to get a little bit interested in the bill."

However, Rock Against Cancer isn't aimed at reaching senators, but children.

And it's predominant vehicle has not been bills, but beats.

The nonprofit already has established eight Schools of Rock, adding four more by the end of this year.

N.C. Children's Hospital is one of three in the state which has a school of rock with instruments, equipment and a certified music therapist.

"Lisa came to me asking if they could buy us some instruments and do some things for music for things in the hospital," said Laurie Reddick, the director of recreational therapy at the hospital. "She was elated and we formed an alliance."

More than two years later, musical therapist Elizabeth Fawcett has joined the alliance, helping children with terminal illnesses through music.

"I've had kids that had told me that without music therapy and without experiencing music at this hospital they don't know if they would have made it through," Fawcett said. "I'm not sure how [White] found out about music therapy, but I'm sure glad she did."

White, with a Ph.D. and married to a physician, did not discover music therapy through her work as a scientist.

Rather, she discovered it through her son.

During Gabriel's treatment, she witnessed him listening to David Gray's White Ladder CD almost religiously, every day for almost six years.

When he was anxious, or could not sleep, the music provided him with comfort.

"If you can imagine 18 months of bone marrow biopsies and hospitalizations thinking he was going to die, to see him pick up something on his own like that -- it was a godsend," White said.

So she founded Rock Against Cancer, and began reaching out to recording artists, moved by music's ability to help "kids survive emotionally intact."

Since then, the organization has also organized benefit concerts for children with cancer to meet stars like Beyonce and Gwen Stefani.

"I'll see the kids in the clinic, see them getting chemo," White said. "They're bald, they don't care, they get to meet huge stars and it's just a blast.

"We do all this as a tribute to the kids -- because we know our kid is still with us and we're happy."

To see more of The Herald-Sun, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.herald-sun.com.