BackgroundThe incidence of childhood cancer increased through the second half of the twentieth century and continues to increase today.
Incredible progress has been made in treating childhood cancers but the pace of progress has now slowed and a substantial minority of patients are failed by therapy and do not survive.
In addition, the tremendous gains in survival have been achieved through the use of increasingly intensive treatment regimens, putting young patients at risk of adverse, treatment-related effects.
Research aims
- We want to understand more about why children develop cancer, to find explanations for the increase in risk and to establish whether prevention is a possibility.
- We want to drive forward the development of novel approaches to diagnosis, identification of markers of likely outcome and improved treatments for childhood cancer in order to tackle those forms which still elude successful treatment and to minimise the risk of adverse, treatment-related effects.
- We want to understand more about the long-term risks faced by childhood cancer survivors, of whom there are now more than 30,000 in the UK.
Read more: Our full research strategy
In 2010, we made grants of £823,000 for research into childhood cancer (2009: £2.21 million).
We award grants to institutions like universities, medical and scientific research centres, and hospitals.
Only researchers based at institutions in the UK can apply for funding. We fund research overseas only if it is part of a collaboration being led from the UK.
Part of the criteria for the award of a grant is that there is adequate infrastructure to support the proposed work.
Our
research strategy sets out the key areas of research we have decided we need to focus on.
We invite grant applications, either as part of a themed grants round or on an ad hoc basis in areas of particular interest.
Grants are made following a rigorous process of peer review during which opinion is sought from our own scientific advisors as well as external reviewers.
For our grants rounds we convene a specialist panel to review the applications we receive. The 2011 grant panel comprised:
- Professor Geoff Pilkington (Chair)
- Professor Jill Birch
- Professor Pat Buffler
- Dr Nicholas Goulden
- Professor Patricia McKinney
- Dr Malcolm Taylor and
- Dr Tracy Warr.
CHILDREN with CANCER is a member of the Association of Medical Research Charities (AMRC).
The AMRC sets minimum standards of good practice to which member charities must adhere in their grant-making, including policies on peer review.
Visit AMRC website
We keep in touch with grant-holders during the period of their grant to monitor their progress and keep track of findings.
Under our terms and conditions of funding, all grant-holders must provide annual reports on the progress of their project and a final report at the end of the grant.
We endeavour to visit each project at least once during the course of the grant – to meet the research team, inspect the research facilities and check on the progress of the work.
We place great importance on the dissemination of results, so that those working in the field can learn from other people’s research.
We closely monitor the progress of the projects we fund and encourage scientists to publish the results of their work where possible.
We provide additional funding for researchers to travel to conferences and meetings to present their work and discuss their findings.
As well as funding a number of conferences and meetings, we have ourselves hosted two international conferences. These conferences – held in 2004 and 2008 – both focused on the causes of childhood leukaemia and attracted delegates and speakers from leading research centres around the world.
We will be hosting our
third international conference in London in April 2012 -
Childhood Cancer 2012.
The treatments which save the lives of hundreds of children every year could not have been developed without the use of animals.
We continue to fund research to find improved treatments which will cure even the hardest-to-treat forms of childhood cancer, causing minimum side effects for the child.
We do not seek to influence the research procedures of the scientists we fund. Neither do we control the nature of research projects that take place in buildings that we have funded.
However, all research we fund undergoes rigorous peer review and assessment by our expert scientific advisors to ensure that it is necessary and valuable.
In addition, all animal research carried out in the UK is subject to the strict regulations set out in the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986. We take steps to ensure that researchers carrying out projects abroad adhere to similar standards.
We have never funded any research using human embryos.
We are currently funding one project involving human embryonic stem cells.
Mostly, however, references to the use of ‘stem cells’ in our research refers to ‘haematopoietic stem cells’. These are primitive blood cells which have the potential to develop into any of the different kind of blood cells.