Telling the patient's story

Jerry Brewer of The Seatttle Times has spent the last five months telling the story of an amazing little girl Gloria Strauss and her family. Gloria was fighting neuroblastoma, a vicious childhood cancer. The parents gave Jerry and The Seattle Times full access as they prayed for a miracle for their little girl. They wanted to tell their story. They wanted to share their faith that gave them strength, their hope, their love. Jerry Brewer kept a reporter's journal where he recorded his thoughts on telling this life-changing and career-changing story. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003897807_gloria23.html

Brewer said, "I could have written this series many different ways. I could have focused on the medical side of this vexing disease. I could have focused on the suffering. I could have focused on how a father with a sick child, a wife with multiple sclerosis and six other children struggled as the family's only source of income.

But this had to be about faith.

If I had written about the experience any other way, I would have either ignored or de-emphasized the most pivotal part of the Strausses' lives."

Brewer captured what many families and patients want in their last days. They want their story told. They want to be heard with compassion.

And thanks to The Seattle Times and Jerry Brewer, we all got to share in Gloria's story.