Last week was an incredibly exciting and encouraging week for cancer research. In case you missed it we wanted to bring this news to your attention:

cancer breakthrough

“In the research published Wednesday, doctors at the University of Pennsylvania say the treatment made the most common type of leukemia completely disappear in two of the patients and reduced it by 70 percent in the third. In each of the patients as much as five pounds of cancerous tissue completely melted away in a few weeks, and a year later it is still gone.”

The treatment is a type of immunotherapy which redirects T-cells to attack cancer cells with minimal side effects. This T-cell therapy is the same approach that immunotherapy pioneer Dr. Michael Jensen is taking at Seattle Children’s new Center for Childhood Cancer Research.

Here is what Dr. Jensen had to say in reponse:

KOMO 4

Here is a critical detail:

“Both the National Cancer Institute and several pharmaceutical companies declined to pay for the research. Neither applicants nor funders discuss the reasons an application is turned down. But good guesses are the general shortage of funds and the concept tried in this experiment was too novel and, thus, too risky for consideration.

The researchers did manage to get a grant from the Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy, a charity founded by Barbara and Edward Netter after their daughter-in-law died of cancer. The money was enough to finance the trials on the first three patients.”

Private philanthropy made this happen. Ben Towne Foundation has partnered with the Center for Childhood Cancer Research for exactly this purpose—to bring this kind of radical new treatment to children. Dr. Jensen and the Center are working on therapies that will change the way pediatric cancers are treated and cured.

Thank you for your investment in this incredible work.

When I was a Junior in college my best friend and college roommate, Luke Voiles, was diagnosed with a rare form of liver cancer. He went from being a 6 foot 3, 220lb freak-of-nature college athlete to a 100 lb shell of a man in just eleven months.  After riding the rollercoaster with Luke, celebrating the highs of a liver transplant to morning the lows of feeding him strawberry yogurt just three days before he died, I made a promise to Luke and his legacy that I would do everything in my power to end this horrible disease. I shared Luke’s story with my class four years ago when I was having a really sad day. One of my students came up to me after class and asked me, “Why don’t you do something about it?” I took that challenge and ran with it.  Every year since then I have held a fundraiser for various cancer research foundations. When my wife Leah told me about Ben Towne Foundation, I began reading about Ben and the family’s story.  It hit home to me and Ben’s story was fairly similar to Luke’s. (more…)