Breakthrough children’s cancer research backed by $5 million grant
A $5 million funding boost is set to transform the treatment of childhood cancers in Australia, offering new hope for children with cancers that were once considered “untreatable”.
The grant, from the Australian Cancer Research Foundation, will help researchers develop precision medicine therapies and bring them closer to detecting cancers before symptoms even appear.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: $5 million grant from the Australian Cancer Research Foundation.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.7NEWS spoke with the family of one-year-old Scout, who is living proof of the potential of the breakthrough.
Scout was born with a rare and aggressive brain tumour and endured months of treatment from a young age, including surgery and chemotherapy.
However, the cancer continued to grow.
“It was a high-grade glioma ... it’s a very aggressive one,” Scout’s father Sean Bradstreet told 7NEWS.
Fortunately, Children’s Cancer Institute doctors were able to identify a rare genetic mutation within her tumour, making it susceptible to a new type of treatment — a drug typically used for adult lung cancer.
After just one month on the treatment, Scout’s tumour shrank by an incredible 30 per cent.
Such precision medicine is not yet accessible to all paediatric cancer patients, however.
But with new funding, researchers hope they are one step closer to finding treatments for the nearly one-third of childhood cancer patients who do not yet have targeted therapies available to them.
Children’s Cancer Institute Professor Michelle Haber told 7NEWS by identifying genetic predispositions they could potentially develop drugs that target those genes before cancer develops.
“We can test against novel immunotherapies ... a new generation of drugs,” she said.
“There is no other country in the world that has that database and these tools.”
The grant will help fund the development of a revolutionary 3D bioprinter, capable of replicating a child’s tumour and surrounding immune cells.
This will allow researchers to test new treatments, including novel immunotherapies and cutting-edge drugs.
Additionally, the funding will support the creation of advanced DNA diagnostic tools that could detect cancer before symptoms appear, offering the possibility to intervene early and even prevent the disease from developing in at-risk children.
- With Amber Laidler
Originally published on 7NEWS
