ANN ARBOR, MI - A young wife’s untimely death from brain cancer and her husband’s recognition that the whole patient – body, mind and spirit – should be treated during the disease process, have resulted in a generous gift to support integrative medicine at the University of Michigan Medical School.

Gayle Kahn

When Mark Kahn met Gayle Halperin Spector in 1996, she was a beautiful, vibrant young woman. Divorced with two children, Gayle had recovered completely from a 1990 diagnosis of brain cancer and treatment with surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

Their romance blossomed and the couple set a date to marry in 1997. However, six weeks before the wedding, Gayle’s brain tumor returned, and she needed a craniotomy to remove the cancerous tumor. The wedding took place as scheduled, and Gayle began chemotherapy and radiation therapy after the honeymoon.

“Gayle never lost hope for a full recovery, and she never lost the energy for her relationship with her family,” Kahn says.

Kahn remembers his wife as a generous and dynamic woman, filling her life with deep commitments, both professional and personal. Before motherhood, Gayle had been a successful businesswoman, working in public relations and advertising in Chicago and metro Detroit. Her first child, Amanda, was born just after she was diagnosed with the first brain tumor. Gayle rose to the challenge, becoming a full-time mother while, at the same time, undergoing her first craniotomy, chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

Matthew was born several years later. As the children grew, Gayle became active in her children’s school and supported many of its events and programs. Even as she dealt with her life-and-death struggle with cancer, Gayle remained focused on her children, marriage to Kahn, her family and community.

Although Gayle died in the fifth year of their marriage, Kahn says he wouldn’t have missed a single moment of their life together.

“I waited all my life to find a relationship like this,” he says.

As Gayle began treatment for her recurring cancer, Kahn threw his energy into learning everything possible about her condition, including research on the latest treatments for cancer. His studies introduced Kahn to the field of integrative medicine, which combines conventional and complementary approaches to treat the whole person – body, mind and spirit. In treating the whole person, integrative medicine emphasizes the therapeutic relationship and makes use of all appropriate therapies, both conventional and alternative.

Kahn worked with a Utah physician to set up a regimen for Gayle that included vitamins and nutritional supplements.

“It was both an enormous responsibility and a humbling experience to be handling Gayle’s health care decisions. She trusted me to be her buffer and her decision-maker,” Kahn says.

Kahn understood the nutritional regimen would not save his wife. Instead, his goal was to improve her quality of life by countering some of the toxic side-effects of her powerful medications and treatments.

After Gayle’s death, Kahn knew he wanted to make a memorial gift that would help advance integrative medicine. He was looking for a program with two specific attributes:

• Exceptional integration of education, clinical care and research;
• Accessibility to the general public.

Both Kahn and his wife were U-M alumni, and so were their siblings and many other family members. When Kahn looked at the U-M Medical School, he found physicians who were conventionally trained professionals. Yet, they recognized and supported the growing interest in integrating conventional medical treatments with approaches traditionalists often considered alternative or unconventional.

“I was looking for an institution that would use my gift to identify valid ways to reinforce the impact of traditional treatment, and also to educate young physicians to value the integrative approach to the treatment of the whole person,” says Kahn.

To honor her memory, Kahn has made a $2-million endowment gift to the U-M Medical School. The gift will be used to establish the Gayle Halperin Kahn Professorship in Integrative Medicine and will provide funding for that professor to study and evaluate alternative, complementary and holistic healing techniques. The University of Michigan Regents approved establishment of the professorship today.

Kahn hopes that the effectiveness of integrative medicine therapies can be proven, resulting in a scientific basis for the recommendation of integrative medicine treatments, as well as preventive measures.

“It is also my hope that future physicians, patients and others have the opportunity to learn about effective integrative medicine therapies in order to apply them in medical practice to reduce the suffering and enhance the quality of life of patients,” Kahn says.

According to Steven Bolling, M.D., U-M professor of cardiac surgery; director, Program for Integrative Medicine; and director, Complementary and Alternative Medicine Research Center, complementary and alternative therapies are already a $30-billion industry.

“Whether you’re a believer or a non-believer, these kinds of therapies are here to stay. The public wants to know what works and what doesn’t, and physicians have an important role in sorting things out. The intent and effort of the Medical School is to validate integrative medicine therapies for the public. We’re grateful to Mr. Kahn, because his gift will play an essential part in realizing that goal,” Bolling says.

“It has been inspirational to work with Mr. Kahn and see how he has turned his loss into an opportunity to foster an integrative health care system for others. His gift will place Michigan at the forefront of innovation in this important new field of study and care,” says Sara Warber, M.D., U-M assistant professor of family medicine and co-director of the Integrative Medicine Program.

Kahn hopes his gift and what it accomplishes will become a beacon for Gayle’s family and for the community.

“I’d like Gayle’s children, Amanda and Matthew, and, someday, Gayle’s grandchildren, to be able to recognize and take pride in the association between Gayle’s name and progress in integrative medicine,” he says.

Written by: Mary Beth Reilly

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