Dedication

Article Outline

 

BYRL JAMES KENNEDY, “BJ” to all who knew him, died last year of multiple myeloma, at home, with his family, under the care of an oncologist he himself had trained. Called the “Father of Medical Oncology,” he is credited with leading the way to the recognition and board certification of our specialty.

“We are not chemotherapists, we are oncologists,” he would often say 40 years ago, before launching into a patient explanation of why such a distinction was so important. It was this distinction without doubt that led him to add cancer in the elderly to his many other interests, the most notable of which, perhaps, was breast cancer.

BJ was a doctor first, an oncologist second, and a teacher and leader throughout his long and productive career. All of us who knew him are grateful for the important role he played in our lives. Cancer patients who will never hear his name are the beneficiaries of his work. This issue of Seminars in Oncology is dedicated, with love, to BJ.

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• Byrl James Kennedy, MD 1921–2003.