Patel endowment aids future nurses

by Jaclyn Loveless

Eva Torres, a CSUB junior nursing major, is the first recipient of The Ravi and Naina Patel Scholarship Endowment, a scholarship to encourage well-trained nurses to pursue a career in oncology.

Dr. Ravi Patel is an oncologist and founder of the Comprehensive Blood and Cancer Center (CBCC), a treatment and research center located in Bakersfield. Dr. Naina Patel, his wife, is an anesthesiologist and is active in the community.

Torres was born in Zacatecas, Mexico, and immigrated to the United States when she was 1. She is a first generation college student and comes from a large family.

Education is very important to Torres. "Both of my parents ensured that all of their kids valued education and hard work. It was their way of giving us the formula to success in life," she wrote in her scholarship application essay.

She plans to graduate with a bachelor's of science in nursing in the spring 2007 and return to CSUB to pursue her master's. Torres' career goals are to obtain a position in a labor and delivery unit at a local hospital.

Ravi Patel is happy to see Torres' enthusiasm and knows the importance of well-educated nurses. "My wife and I are physicians and we have a special interest in cancer awareness and treatment," he said. "We have a very caring nursing staff that takes excellent care of our patients. We are there with the patients the entire time. From the cancer diagnosis to the chemotherapy, we deal with it. Nurses have become a very important part of that team. The need for cancer care has increased but at the same time the staffing has become an issue.

"The whole Cal State nursing program is energized with the new changes and they're doing very good work," Patel continued. "Cal State is really the grassroots of the community."

Patel is a board certified clinical oncologist who has been in active practice for more than 20 years and founded CBCC some 18 years ago. While serving as managing partner of the center, Patel continues to actively care for his patients and serve as principal investigator on the center's many clinical research studies. The 95,000 square-foot facility provides Kern County residents and others with state-of-the-art cancer care in a modern and caring surrounding. CBCC employs more than 200 clinical, technical and support staff and is home to 15 physicians.

Patel is actively involved with the leading pharmaceutical manufactures and academic research programs to assure that cancer patients in Kern County have access to the most cutting edge medicines and treatments available anywhere in the world. His goal is for every patient treated at CBCC to have access to at least one standard cancer therapy and one more advanced treatment regiment, which CBCC makes available through its rigorously managed program of clinical research trials.

In addition to their support of CSUB, the Patels are active in supporting cancer awareness and education in Kern County and India, through the CBCC Foundation, The Ravi and Naina Patel Foundation and other organizations.

Proceeds from the $50,000 endowment will be used to fund one annual scholarship for a student who demonstrates high academic achievement, financial need and a willingness to practice in Kern County for a minimum of two years following graduation.

Preference will be given to nursing students entering their junior year with an expressed interest in oncology nursing. Recipients are eligible for renewal upon the approval of the donors. Scholarships will be awarded by the nursing scholarship chair with advice from the donors. The Patels also funded the first year with an additional gift of $2,500 for one student this year.