‘This will improve the lives of kids with cancer globally’ – medical research gets $155.5m boost in one week

Two incredible medical research gifts were announced this week, giving a combined boost of more than $150m to the field, particularly in cancer treatments for children. The Stan Perron Charitable Foundation in Western Australia has pledged $135.5m to the Telethon Kids Institute Cancer Centre and Perth Children’s Hospital. A $20 million bequest in NSW by the philanthropist Kay Van Norton Poche AO will give Australians the same access to clinical trials as patients in the US.

The Stan Perron Charitable Foundation gift will be delivered over the next decade to a multi-partner collaboration to support Western Australian children and young people with cancer, which is the leading cause of death by disease for children across the country.

The gift is one of the largest in WA’s history and will transform childhood cancer research and treatments by developing more effective and less toxic treatments. The programs funded by the donation will build on the widely recognised work already undertaken by Perth Children’s Hospital and Telethon Kids Institute.

Perth Children’s Hospital Foundation (PCHF) will also make a multi-million dollar contribution over the next five years with an option to extend and The University of Western Australia will add up to $9 million to help improve the lives of kids impacted by cancer in WA and across the globe.

Child and Adolescent Health Service Chief Executive, Valerie Jovanovic, said at the launch investing in childhood cancer research and care was important with 1,240 Australian children diagnosed with the disease each year. “We have a great opportunity to do more in this space and give our children and young people access to world-leading care and research.

“This field is moving extremely rapidly with precision medicine, genomics and other science advances. The donation will not only benefit Western Australian children – it will allow our Perth Children’s Hospital clinicians and Telethon Kids researchers to contribute to these advances and lead the field in their areas of expertise.”

Chair of the Stan Perron Charitable Foundation, Elizabeth Perron, said the objectives of the Comprehensive Kids Cancer Centre aligned perfectly with the intent of the foundation established by her father. “While the funding is significant, like all projects funded by the foundation, we are concerned less by the amount of money donated but primarily by the impact of the activity on the lives of children.”

Professor Nick Gottardo, head of the Oncology and Haematology Department at PCH, said in the past 70 years only 50 new drugs had been approved to treat paediatric cancers, whereas 60 cancer drugs were approved for adults every year.

“Current treatments for kids cancer cause severe and often life-long side effects including problems with emotions, reproduction, growth, development, hormones, learning, memory problems, heart, lung, digestive system, hearing, vision and most strikingly, can cause secondary cancers,” Professor Gottardo said.

The research enabled by the gift will significantly help discover “more effective and less toxic treatments that will be adopted worldwide to improve the lives of kids impacted by cancer globally”.

The $20 million bequest from Kay Van Norton Poche AO, who died in June after a diagnosis of a rare cancer, will establish a national clinical trial hub Sydney in partnership with the Northern Sydney Local Health District (NSLHD) and the world-renowned Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York.

NORTH S.T.A.R VNP will be located at the Sydney North Health Precinct, which includes Royal North Shore and North Shore Private hospitals, and will be available to all Australians, with regional NSW hospital partnerships also established.

The centre will be used to attract the next generation of doctors, scientists and researchers to Australia and provide greater funding to discover cures through research and development.

Work will also begin on improving collaboration between hospitals, doctors and allied health professionals so every patient can participate in clinical trials, with a focus on rural and regional residents and Aboriginal people, and a vision to expand the number of clinical trials, sites and enrolments nationally.

The NSW Minister for Health, Ryan Park, said: “This global partnership will enhance treatment for NSW residents with cancer and position our hospitals as the centre of international collaboration between the brightest minds in the medical world.

“We thank Greg Poche AO and the late Kay Van Norton Poche AO for their immense generosity and belief in our expert team of healthcare professionals across NSW.”

NSLHD chair of research Bruce Robinson will lead the project and was quoted by the ABC as saying it has traditionally been difficult to attract clinical trials to Australia.

“This partnership is massive for patients who have cancer. It will allow them to get access to trials which will prolong or even save their lives. It also helps to ease the frustration that they have when they can see that there is treatment for them in other parts of the world they can’t access.”

The ABC said that in a recorded video message before her death, Ms Van Norton Poche said: “We are fighting the good fight with you. Take this and go out there and let’s beat this to death.”

Pictured above (left to right): UWA Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) Professor Anna Nowak, Child and Adolescent Health Service Chief Executive Valerie Jovanovic, Health Minister Amber-Jade Sanderson, Tracey Hollington, Cancer Centre Clinical Lead Professor Nick Gottardo, Medical Research Minister Stephen Dawson, Stan Perron Charitable Foundation Chair Elizabeth Perron, Cancer Centre Scientific Lead Associate Professor Joost Lesterhuis, Telethon Kids Institute Executive Director Professor Jonathan Carapetis, Perth Children’s Hospital Foundation CEO Carrick Robinson. Front Row: 21-year-old-child cancer survivor Angus Hollington.