The Childhood Cancer Blog
The Childhood Cancer Blog
Like our famous lemonade, the temperatures are icy cold all winter long. Instead of hiding from cold winter days, warm yourself up with some good times for a great cause!
Childhood cancer hero Matthew, pictured above, raised over $8,000 at his hot chocolate stand.
Build awareness and gingerbread houses to raise funds for research. Pictured above, guests at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City party decorate houses to benefit ALSF.
Lemons are sour--but raising money for childhood cancer is sweet! Above, contestants in the Northwestern Mutual Lemon Face contest make their lemon faces!
by Trish Adkins
Like our famous lemonade, the temperatures outside are icy cold this winter. Instead of hiding from cold winter days, warm up with some good times for a worthy cause! You can help Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation (ALSF) fight childhood cancer and gets kids closer to cures. From making crazy lemon faces to swapping lemonade for hot chocolate, there are so many fun ways you can fund childhood cancer research through ALSF!
1. Swap out Lemonade for Hot Chocolate
ALSF supporter and childhood cancer hero Matthew hosted “Matthew’s Miraculous Hot Cocoa Stand for... Read More
by Adam Paris
Eden is a 13 year old who loves to shoot photos and smile for her own snapshots. After being unable to walk or practice her favorite activity, dancing, for nearly a year, she was diagnosed at age 10 with a cancer no doctor had ever seen before. They tried standard chemotherapies for two different types of solid tumors similar to her cancer and after many months doctors deemed her cancer-free in March 2016.
Two years... Read More
Hailing from all over the world, the 90 researchers were invited to the first-ever ALSF Crazy 8 meeting in Philadelphia in September 2018.
The most common type of extra-cranial childhood cancer in children, neuroblastoma has seen an increase in long-term survival rates over the past 10 years (from 30% to 50-60%, depending on stage of disease and age at diagnosis). However, the hardest, high-risk neuroblastoma continues to be tricky to cure, requiring years and years of harsh treatments that leave children with long-term side effects.
Making up the largest group of brain tumors, embryonal brain cancers include medulloblastoma, rhabdomyosarcoma and other subtypes. The standard of care for embryonal brain tumors is surgery, radiation and intensive chemotherapy. Each of these treatments comes with the potential for severe side effects.
High grade gliomas, which include DIPG and ependymoma, are notoriously hard to treat because of their location in the brain and their fast growing nature. Presently, DIPG has a zero-percent long-term survival rate.
While some types of leukemia, like acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), have long-term remission rates of around 90-percent; relapsed and refractory ALL and other less-common leukemias, like acute myeloid leukemia (AML), are harder to treat and present significantly lower remission rates.
Fusion positive sarcomas form as the result of a genetic chromosomal transcription that creates a new malignant cell. Ewing sarcoma is the most prominent example, but other cancer types like alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma can also be fusion positive.
Fusion negative sarcomas are sarcoma-type cancers that do not have abnormalities that follow a specific genetic pattern, like fusion positive sarcomas.
Researchers have long struggled with the accessibility and availability of pediatric oncology data. The first challenge is the general lack of genetic models because of the rarity of some types of childhood cancer. The second challenge is the reverse—there are millions of data sets, all written in different formats and therefore hard to access and utilize.
Clinical trials are one of the critical ways that researchers can test and discover treatments that work in children. Trials are also the key step on the way to setting new standards of care. Crazy 8 researchers know that trials can be done more efficiently and remove roadblocks, such as funding for research, to accelerate cures.
by Trish Adkins
In September, Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation (ALSF) called over 90 top scientists, pediatric oncologists and researchers from around the world to gather in Philadelphia to discuss the big question:
How can we cross the finish line and find cures for all children fighting cancer?
The meeting kicked off the Crazy 8 Initiative—ALSF’s commitment to identifying obstacles, knocking down roadblocks and developing a comprehensive, achievable plan to foster research, collaborate and accelerate cures... Read More
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