Dear Drs. Ondrey, Fujioka, and Lee,

As I approach seven years of cancer survival, I want to express gratitude for the great care you provided. Together with your team members, you have taken me from stage IV head and neck cancer to remission.

Your team approach, involving specialists in surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation, resulted in favorable outcomes for me. In our first visit, Dr. Ondrey, you told me about this collaboration, and I experienced it at my first appointment in radiation. Dr. Lee, you entered the exam room and remarked, “Although this is our first meeting, I feel as if I know you well. We have been studying your case since your surgery.” This gave me great confidence in my team!

Prior to my radiation and chemotherapy treatments, I was given the option of treatment at my local hospital, much closer to my home than M Health Fairview University of Minnesota Medical Center and not involving a congested interstate. But I already knew of your team and your collaboration and placed great value in this approach. 

My decision to commute daily, for six weeks, proved to be the right choice. This was especially evident when the cancer returned. I was confident that my best solutions would emerge from discussion among my M Health Fairview physicians.

I was right! Thank you to you and the members of your teams. I cannot imagine better care, anywhere!

—Bill Johnson, in a letter to M Health Fairview physicians Frank Ondrey, M.D., Ph.D., Naomi Fujioka, M.D., and Chung Lee, M.D. (retired), and their teams