When you enter the magnetic field of her presence, something brightens inside of you. It is her playfulness and her intelligence, her directness and her kindness. It is the light in her eyes.

How sad then, how crushing it must have been for her family when Jazmin�s life was placed in jeopardy when she was just 6 years old.

Taken to Sinai�s ER-7 with a temperature of 104, Jazmin was even more ill than her parents feared. Tests showed that she had acute lymphocytic leukemia. That diagnosis began an ordeal of chemotherapy and intensive, often difficult treatments and continual hospital visits.

When they made the leukemia diagnosis, it was devastating,� Patricia Veney, her mother says. Then they told us that there was a new, better chemotherapy drug that would increase her chances. Of course, we wanted the best for our daughter, so we chose that.�

Leukemia is a multidimensional disease requiring sophisticated management through the long course of its treatment. This is where Sinai excels. Because of the broad range of our subspecialists, and our participation in clinical trials of the newest drugs, we have the advantage of offering our patients the latest, most effective forms of treatment�often long before they are widely available. Many young lives have been saved because of this.

Jazmin responded to treatment very quickly. Soon, her blood count was improving.
Over the next two years, she received biweekly, then monthly chemotherapy treatments. Despite long absences from school, Jazmin kept up with her studies and remained an A� student.

Today, Jazmin is 11, and a student at the McDonogh School. When you ask her or her parents about their experience at Sinai, they first mention not the treatments, but the people: Dr. Joseph Wiley, chairman of The Children�s Hospital and an expert in pediatric leukemia, whom they consider a friend, and a host of others. They talk about the emotional difficulty and the help they received. They know they received the best medical care available, and that comes first of course, but it is the people they will never forget.