Barbara Rubenstein, March 9, 2006, San Antonio, TX

She works part-time, plays golf, and cruises to foreign lands. For Barbara Rutstein, this is life, and she’s loving it.

Diagnosed in 2003 with advanced non-small cell lung cancer, Barbara, a non-smoker, underwent typically grueling chemotherapy and radiation treatment. “It wasn’t really happening for me,” the now 57-year-old from San Antonio, Texas, says. “It wasn’t going away.” Three years later, Barbara takes Tarceva – a convenient pill taken in the comfort of her home – in the morning and then goes about her day like it was any other. She works half-time in her husband’s rheumatology office and leads an active social life, complete with athletic activities and a DVD a night.

“My husband calls me his ‘miracle girl,’” she says. “Some months I have skin rashes, but no diet restrictions, no other side effects. Tarceva is just another pill.”

Barbara appreciates not only what Tarceva has done for her, but also the effort OSI put into discovering and then developing the treatment. “I couldn’t be more grateful for the scientific breakthrough,” she says. “People worked long, hard hours, years, to make this incredible medicine happen for people like me. Certainly, it meant something to OSI to bring Tarceva along, and it means even more to me that they felt that way.”		  
 


Char Warner , March 16, 2006, Strongsville, OH

Char Warner has been to the dark side – and come back. In early 2003, Char, an 83-year-old resident of Strongsville, Ohio, with age-related macular degeneration, was rapidly losing sight in her one good eye. When it came to reading, a favorite activity, “I couldn’t see the page,” she recalls, not even in a large-print book. But now, three years later, Char can legally drive. Those three years were spent enrolled in Macugen clinical trials aimed at stabilizing her vision. Macugen improved it, instead.

Macugen also restored Char’s psyche. “I had never experienced any kind of depression before, but now I know what it feels like,” she says. Before Macugen, AMD was robbing her of the simple joys in life, like seeing the faces of her grandchildren, reading The Plain Dealer, or perusing the choices on a menu at a restaurant, all things she can do now, provided she has enough light.

“When you don’t know how dependent you’re going to become, it’s a devastating thing,” she says. “Taking Macugen has been a very gratifying experience for me. The depression has lifted, of course. The medicine has saved my sight, and for this, I am extremely grateful.”