Test tubes and petri dishes are all over the place in medical laboratories such as Dr. William Schoolcraft’s Lone Tree-based .
But at a fancy fundraising gala held at Denver’s swank ?
Sure, if it’s the Mad Scientist Ball, Version 3.0.
The petri dishes circulated during cocktail hour contained a variety of scrumptious appetizers, and the test tubes that were on sale for $50 each contained certificates redeemable for prizes like a stroller, jewelry and a .
Special guests at the dinner-dance, which raised $172,000, were two of Schoolcraft’s celebrity patients, Bill and Giuliana Rancic.
Bill Rancic was the winner of Season 1 of ” ” and stars with his wife on the reality TV show Giuliana is also co-anchor of ” ” and a co-host of ” .”
Their first child, a son, was born to a surrogate mother at in August 2012.
Perceptions regarding infertility have changed immensely since 1978, when Louise Brown of England became the world’s first “test tube baby,” thanks to professor Robert Edwards’ work with in vitro fertilization.
Brown was a curiosity then, but today the procedure is relatively commonplace, and terms such as test-tube baby are obsolete.
“It doesn’t matter how you get your baby,” Bill Rancic said after Schoolcraft introduced his colleague Dr. Mandy Katz-Jaffe and her team of senior scientists and embryologists. “Birth is a miracle, and when that baby is in your arms, you don’t care how it arrived.”
The Rancics were seated with Schoolcraft and his wife, Cheri; Dev and Dorothy Paul; Jimmy and Kimberley Parsley; Jim and Anne Hillary; Paul and Susan Valas; Jon and Leslie Pardew; and Katz-Jaffe and her husband, Justin Jaffe.
Dev Paul has been Giuliana’s oncologist since her breast cancer was discovered in 2011, right before she was to start her third round of in vitro fertilization treatments with Schoolcraft. She had a double mastectomy and will remain on tamoxifen for another three years.
Others at the Mad Scientist Ball included such planning committee members as Jamie Angelich, Kay Burke, Cindi Burge, Lyni McLaughlin and Xan Gregory; Dana Berry; Erin Hirstine; Sully Sullivan; and 7News’ Dayle Cedars, the mistress of ceremonies, who reminded guests that “Tonight’s not about just changing lives, it’s about creating them.”
The mission of the nonprofit National Foundation for Fertility Research is to advance the field of reproductive medicine so that infertile couples have “a real chance” at having children of their own.
Joanne Davidson: 303-809-1314, jdavidson@ denverpost.com or twitter.com/joannedavidson
Online: More pictures from this event denverpost.com/seengallery
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