Mount Sinai South Nassau Receives $1 Million Donation To Expand Cancer Patient Clinical Trials and Research on Long Island

The Betty Ajces Trust has donated $1 million to Mount Sinai South Nassau to help the hospital expand access to cancer clinical trials and research on Long Island.

This is the second major gift the hospital has received from the Trust, which donated $200,000 last August to establish the Leon and Betty Ajces Memorial Fund at Mount Sinai South Nassau as well as to benefit the hospital’s cancer research and prevention efforts.

“This generous gift will help us give patients with a cancer diagnosis the opportunity to enroll in clinical trials for the latest innovations in cancer therapies, technologies, and treatment protocols,” said Adhi Sharma, MD, President of Mount Sinai South Nassau. “Instead of having to travel to New York City, this gift will allow us to enroll patients in cutting-edge trials right here on Long Island.”

“Mount Sinai South Nassau has demonstrated that it is committed to advancing research and access to the latest cancer treatments,” said Alan E. Weiner, CPA, JD, Trustee of the Betty Ajces Trust and a longtime friend of Mr. and Mrs. Ajces. “As per the mission of the Ajces Trust, we are pleased to support the hospital’s expansion of cancer research and treatment on Long Island.”

As a National Clinical Trial Network affiliate within the Mount Sinai Health System, Mount Sinai South Nassau’s Department of Clinical Research is part of a prestigious collection of organizations and clinicians in the United States, Canada, and around the globe. The group leads clinical trials to establish new standards of care, sets the stage for regulatory approval of new therapies, tests new treatment approaches, and validates new human genome biomarkers.

Based at the hospital’s Gertrude & Louis Feil Cancer Center in Valley Stream, the Mount Sinai South Nassau Department of Clinical Research is staffed by a clinical research manager, nurse, and coordinator. The staff at Mount Sinai South Nassau works in coordination with its counterparts at The Tisch Cancer Institute, a National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center that is part of the Mount Sinai Health System in Manhattan. The Tisch Cancer Institute is a leader in cancer research, and the $1 million gift from the Ajces Trust will help Mount Sinai South Nassau extend access on Long Island to clinical trials already underway at The Tisch Cancer Institute.

A Protocol Review Committee, composed of a dozen members representing clinical specialties and support services, reviews all protocols and clinical studies to ensure alignment with the National Cancer Institute Central Institutional Review Board, as well as the hospital’s mission. They are then forwarded to the Institutional Review Board, which provides regulatory review, approval, and monitoring of clinical trials conducted at the hospital to ensure the protection of patients participating in the trials.

Mount Sinai South Nassau currently has patients enrolled in breast and lung cancer clinical trials.

“Many of our patients on Long Island want access to clinical trials but they do not necessarily want to travel to New York City given the time and expense involved,” said Rajiv Datta, MD, Chair of the Department of Surgery at Mount Sinai South Nassau and Director of the Feil Cancer Center in Valley Stream. “Every trial and every patient enrolled requires proper support. This gift will allow us to provide that support and help kickstart further expansion of access.”

“We have been working with our colleagues at Mount Sinai South Nassau to develop our clinical trial footprint on Long Island by expanding access to cancer clinical trials and research ,” said Karyn Goodman, MD, MS, the Associate Director of Clinical Research at The Tisch Cancer Institute. “This gift helps us improve access to cutting-edge treatment and clinical trails, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. It will have a real and positive impact on our patients.”

Betty Ajces, born in Jackson Heights, Queens, in 1929, was the daughter of Louis Green, who played clarinet with the NBC Symphony Orchestra under Principal Conductor Arturo Toscanini. After graduating from high school in 1947, Ms. Ajces toured with an "all-girl" jazz trio, playing throughout the country in the late 1940s and early 1950s. She continued to perform in community orchestras into her 80s, serving as Chair of the Board of the Rockaway-Five Towns Orchestra for many years. Ms. was 93 when she died in August 2022 after suffering a stroke.

Ms. Ajces’ beloved husband of 42 years Leon Ajces died in 1999. The Ukrainian-born immigrant fought in World War II as a Jewish major in the Red Army of Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union and defected to the United States in 1948. His remarkable story of transformation from a Soviet military intelligence officer to a loyal patriot and enormously successful businessperson is chronicled in the 2003 book "Songa's Story: How a Shtetl Jew Found the American Dream," by Natalie Green Giles, Mr. and Mrs. Ajces’ niece.

Accredited by the American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer with the prestigious “commendation” designation, the Gertrude & Louis Feil Cancer Center is the hub of Mount Sinai South Nassau’s cancer program. Treating approximately 2,500 patients annually, the Gertrude & Louis Feil Cancer Center is equipped with three of the most advanced and effective technologies used to treat and eradicate cancer: the Varian Novalis Tx™, da Vinci® Surgical System, and Gamma Knife® Perfexion.

Mount Sinai South Nassau’s cancer program also includes services for liver (hepatobiliary) cancer, an expanded staff of medical oncologists, and a chemotherapy infusion center. Through its partnership with the Mount Sinai Health System and The Tisch Cancer Institute, patients also have access to innovative clinical trials and a roster of leading oncologists who specialize in treating a range of cancers, both common and rare.

About Mount Sinai South Nassau
The Long Island flagship hospital of the Mount Sinai Health System, Mount Sinai South Nassau is designated a Magnet® hospital by the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) for outstanding nursing care. Mount Sinai South Nassau is one of the region’s largest hospitals, with 455 beds, more than 900 physicians and 3,500 employees. Located in Oceanside, New York, the hospital is an acute-care, not-for-profit teaching hospital that provides state-of-the-art care in cardiac, oncologic, orthopedic, bariatric, pain management, mental health, and emergency services and operates the only Trauma Center on the South Shore of Nassau County, along with Long Island’s only free-standing Emergency Department in Long Beach.

In addition to its extensive outpatient specialty centers, Mount Sinai South Nassau provides emergency and elective angioplasty, and offers Novalis Tx™ and Gamma Knife® radiosurgery technologies. Mount Sinai South Nassau operates the only Trauma Center on the South Shore of Nassau County verified by the American College of Surgeons as well as Long Island’s only free-standing, 9-1-1 receiving Emergency Department in Long Beach. Mount Sinai South Nassau also is a designated Stroke Center by the New York State Department of Health and Comprehensive Community Cancer Center by the American College of Surgeons; is an accredited center of the Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Association and Quality Improvement Program; and an Infectious Diseases Society of America Antimicrobial Stewardship Center of Excellence.
For more information, go to www.mountsinai.org/southnassau.