Press On Updates

Atlanta, GA:   The Press On Fund and the Rising Tide Foundation for Clinical Cancer Research (RTFCCR) are pleased to announce their first collaborative grant in the amount of $800,000 to Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles (CHLA), Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta (CHOA), and the University of Southern California, to initiate the New Approaches to Neuroblastoma…

Did you know only 4% of federal funding for cancer goes to childhood cancer research, despite the fact that childhood cancer kills more American children than any other disease? About 60% of all funding for the development of new drugs for adult cancer comes from pharmaceutical companies, but those companies provide almost no funding for…

Dear Press On supporters, we look forward to updating you periodically about progress being made as a result of Press On grants. We are very grateful for your belief in our cause and your trust that we will use your money wisely. This edition will focus on exciting developments at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in the fight against neuroblastoma. One of Press On’s primary goals is taking the laboratory discoveries enabled by Press On support and applying those discoveries in the clinic through clinical trials. Remarkably, Dr. Wing Leung and his talented support staff have opened three clinical trials as a result of Press On funding! If that weren’t exciting enough, Dr. Leung has also published an article in the peer-reviewed journal Blood that specifically credits Press On!

On the first anniversary of Patrick’s death, January 9, 2013, we celebrated his life by dedicating a state of the art MIBG facility at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. Patrick travelled to Philadelphia and New York frequently for treatment not available in Atlanta, including four MIBG treatments at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. The first two were intended to be curative; the latter two merely palliative. All four were necessary as we fought for his life. As a reminder, MIBG is a radioactive tracer delivered intravenously that is absorbed by neuroblastoma cells. It is used at low doses to measure a neuroblastoma patient’s tumor burden. At high doses the radiation kills neuroblastoma cells while sparing nearby cells. As MIBG veterans, we recognized that MIBG treatment, either alone or in combination with other agents, was here to stay as part of neuroblastoma treatment. But there was no MIBG center located in the southeast during our battle. We at Press On changed that by funding the construction of the MIBG suite at CHOA, which uniquely includes two separate rooms – one for the patients and one for the family, as well as cutting edge technology designed to better entertain the kids and the parents during the four day isolation period. Importantly, the design also promised to reduce radiation exposure to the caregivers – both patents and clinicians.

Below is a letter written to Brennan from his Uncle Quniton Stevens after completing he completed the 1st of his 2 Half Iron Man competitions – this year!. Despite the physical challenges that presented themselves during his race, he Pressed On! Since this letter was written Q, as we all lovinging refer to him, has successfully completed his 2 Half Iron Man competitions in Brennan’s honor.

Dear Brennan,

Uncle Q has been mightily impressed by how tough you have been over the last two years. Hearing how you and your parents have dealt with the challenges you have faced has inspired me and I’m sure thousands of other people who have followed your journey through your Daddy and Mommy’s CarePages updates.

We are humbled by the amazing success of our fifth annual Play for Patrick Tennis Tournaments. We are still in the process of tabulating the results of the weekend, but we estimate that we raised around $75,000!!! I am grateful to the many people who helped plan the weekend, donated items to the auction, sponsored our efforts, and donated to the cause.

Dear Friends of CURE:
With the New Year well under way, and with your gracious contributions to the Press On to Cure Childhood Cancer Fund already invested in three meaningful and potentially revolutionary research initiatives, we are writing to deliver our 2010-2011 fiscal year update.