So, we clearly need to develop better treatments for cancer, and immunotherapy is currently the most promising avenue for such treatments. The result all too often is that the patient will undergo these very unpleasant treatments and appear to be cancer-free only to have the cancer reemerge years later. And some cancers have or can develop an extraordinary resistance to radiation or chemo. If surgeons miss the smallest microscopic piece of tumor or some of the tumor has already broken off and moved elsewhere by itself, the cancer can regrow (which is why surgery is usually combined with chemotherapy and/or radiation). For example, Chris developed severe heart disease from the chemotherapy.Īnd none of these methods of treatment are totally reliable. Some of these side effects can be permanent. Surgery is painful and debilitating and radiation and chemotherapy almost always cause extremely unpleasant side effects. BackĬonventional Treatments and Their LimitationsĪlmost everyone knows someone who has had cancer, and almost every one of those patients has been treated through some combination of surgery, chemotherapy and/or radiation therapy.Īnyone who has gone through this kind of treatment will tell you that it is very unpleasant. You can read a better explanation of immunotherapy here. The problem is that the immune system doesn’t recognize and attack all cancers the research we are funding will try to find ways to get the immune system to recognize and destroy these cancers too. In fact, there would be many, many more cancers than we experience if not for one thing: our immune systems have developed ways to identify many kinds of pre-cancerous cells and kill them before they can cause any damage, just like they kill bacterial or viral infections. Gene replication is a very complicated chemical reaction that can be modified by the influence of heat, radiation, acidity, nearby chemicals, viruses and many other things. Every plant and animal on earth has cells that multiply so they can grow and repair injuries, and all of them have genes that can start misbehaving in this way. This can be caused by heredity or environmental factors like smoking, or even completely by random chance.Ĭancer seems unnatural but it really isn’t. Unless stopped, these cancerous cells form a tumor that grows so large that it eventually interferes with vital functions and kills its victim.Ĭells become cancerous when something goes wrong with the genes that are supposed to program the cell to behave properly. You can learn more about the research here:Ĭancer occurs when one or more of the cells in your body “goes renegade” and begins to rapidly and uncontrollably multiply. In sum, we feel very committed to and impressed both by the way Penn operates and how they plan to use our funding. This is the way all cancer research should be handled, but not enough research facilities actually do. Third, Penn has developed a culture of collaboration between departments and also with other third-party research facilities that seems phenomenal. Dogs are also more similar to humans than most other animals used for testing new treatments. Dogs get certain cancers far more often than humans do, and dog owners are often willing to try new treatments that may not prove as grueling to their pets as standard treatments. Second, Penn has one of the top canine veterinary facilities in the world, and that turns out to be a huge advantage in cancer research. That particularly applies to immunotherapy, where Penn has been one of the leaders for many years. Its reputation and facilities are world class, so if you are among the top tier of researchers Penn is one of the first places you’d want to work. It really is in a pretty unique position to make breakthroughs in immunology and other cancer research.įirst, Penn has attracted some of the best cancer researchers available. Why Penn? As we began looking into it, we were very impressed by the nature of the research Penn is doing. Although our support for the University of Miami has produced some significant results, we decided that we wanted to work with a research center closer to our home base. This year we began working with the Penn Medicine’s Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |