Robert & Blanche Bast

After finishing his second year at Harvard Medical School in 1967, Robert Bast paused his coursework for two years to pursue anatomic pathology and immunological research at Massachusetts General Hospital. “Those were the most educational two years of my career, answering fundamental questions and absorbing clinical medicine, preparing to be a physician-scientist,” says Bast, who returned to HMS and earned his medical degree magna cum laude in 1971.

More than 50 years later, Bast, having served as vice president for translational research for more than two decades at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, points to the urgent need to develop and retain more doctors who both practice medicine and perform translational research.

“Physician-scientists are absolutely essential,” Bast says. “They serve as catalysts to accelerate progress in advancing both patient care and biomedical discovery.” And he would know, having been nationally recognized for his patient care as a medical oncologist while also making landmark discoveries leading to monitoring and earlier detection of ovarian cancer. Bast also coordinates MD Anderson’s physician-scientist training program, where 38 of the 44 graduates (86%) have earned their first individual investigator grant to launch their careers.

In hopes of ensuring a critical mass of individuals who are poised to bridge the divide between medical practice and the basic and social sciences, Bast and his wife, Blanche, recently made a significant gift to HMS to create the Robert C. (MD ’71), and Blanche S. Bast MD-PhD Scholarship Fund. This endowed fund will support HMS students enrolled in the Harvard/MIT MD-PhD Program, which trains the next generation of physician-scientist leaders.

“Both Dean Daley and I prioritize strengthening and expanding our MD-PhD Program, and this gift from the Basts represents a crucial contribution toward achieving this goal,” says HMS Dean for Medical Education Bernard S. Chang, AB ’93, MD, MMSc ’05. George Q. Daley is an alumnus of the program, having received his PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1989 and his MD from HMS in 1991.

The MD-PhD Program not only imparts upon students a comprehensive, innovative medical education but also provides them with an abundance of research training opportunities across the campuses of Harvard University, MIT, the Whitehead Institute, the Broad Institute, and 15 Harvard-affiliated hospitals. Program alumni have helped propel forward critical solutions that define biomedicine’s future—new diagnostics, therapeutics, devices, and economic and health policies.

MD-PhD program Director Loren Walensky, MD, PhD, an HMS professor of pediatrics at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, expressed how grateful he is for the Basts’ generosity. “Their commitment to advancing the integration of clinical care and biomedical research embodies the very spirit of our program,” he says. “This gift will help empower the next generation of physician-scientists to make groundbreaking contributions to medicine and improve health outcomes worldwide.”