"My name is Louis Batson and I’m a cancer survivor.  I was first diagnosed in 1986 and over the years have had a total of sixty-four radiation treatments.  I’ve had abdominal surgery and I was on chemo for eleven years with various types of protocol and various recipes of chemo that was offered and I tried to do as best I could and be as aggressive in the treatment as I could.   Thanks to a lot of the work that’s been done by the American Cancer Society and other organizations we are making progress to beat cancer. Today I feel better than I have felt in the last twenty-five years, even though age has crept up on me a good bit.  I think there are two great things to fight cancer – one is early detection and the other is aggressive treatment.  I urge anyone to get on experimental protocol if they can and try that because miracles happen every day and when they do then after that every day is a holiday.   There is a lot going on these days in cancer research.  I know the American Cancer Society funded the development of the bone marrow transplant and that in itself is a great salvation and I think more and more will be done with that as the years go by.    We have many good doctors here in Greenville and I was originally treated at Duke.  I owe my treatment to my deceased internist.  I was in the beginning misdiagnosed by a dermatologist here in Greenville but during a routine physical my internist insisted that I go and have it looked at and suggested that I either go to Emory or go to Duke and since I had a daughter who lived in Raleigh, I chose to go to Duke and the day after  I went there they started me on chemo and radiation  and some of the internists who were there when I was first there in 1986 through 1988 are now practicing here in Greenville at the hospitals.  There is a lot of good things going on at Greenville with both of the hospitals and with the Cancer Centers of the Carolinas and thanks to the various organizations such as the American Cancer Society we are able to make more progress every day.  I’d be glad to answer any questions for anyone any time I might have    It’s very easy that your family might become depressed because often times they suffer more than the patient does and  patients most now can see the fact that there are cures and that you don’t have to roll over and die just because you have cancer.   Be glad to answer any questions for anybody at anytime."