Cancer strikes roughly one in every 285 children before age 20 in the United States, and a growing number of adults under age 40 receive a diagnosis every year. The good news is that survival rates are improving. But medications are often limited and many cause negative side effects.
For pediatric and young adult cancers, there’s a lack of safe, effective, less toxic treatments. Researchers at City of Hope® want to fill that void. Philanthropy partners, like The Sacchi Foundation, make these novel, life-altering investigations possible.
“At City of Hope, we’re committed to curing childhood cancer, and ensuring survivors live the healthiest, fullest lives possible,” said Saro Armenian, D.O., M.P.H., Barron Hilton Chair in Pediatrics, City of Hope Children’s Cancer Center. “With the support of The Sacchi Foundation, City of Hope aims to change that.”
An Investment in Improving Pediatric Cancer Treatments
In September, the Foundation pledged $5 million to create The Sacchi Foundation Pediatric Research Endowment. The gift will support early-career investigators dedicated to fast-tracking pediatric cancer research. The group also committed $250,000 annually to support investigations currently underway.
With these funds, City of Hope’s early-career physician scientists work toward gentler, more effective treatments for devastating cancers that impact younger patients.
“These extraordinary gifts [from The Sacchi Foundation] will support the next generation of scientific leaders and serve as a catalyst for advancements across cellular and immunotherapy treatments,” Dr. Armenian said. “It will help us bring new hope to children and families facing cancer.”
A Groundbreaking Therapy: Osteosarcoma’s First New Treatment in 50 Years
Osteosarcoma is a rare, aggressive bone cancer that mainly impacts children and younger adults. It causes difficult-to-treat solid tumors and if it has spread or recurs, it has very a low cure rate.
Despite its lethality, the treatment regimen — chemotherapy and surgery — hasn’t changed in nearly 50 years. With funding from The Sacchi Foundation, Lior Goldberg, M.D., M.S., a City of Hope pediatric hematologist-oncologist, seeks to change that.
“In my lab, we’re using funding from The Sacchi Foundation to develop new CAR (chimeric antigen receptor) T cells for osteosarcoma,” he said. “With these cells, we can harness the body’s immune system to fight cancer where other therapies have failed and in a way that is less toxic than conventional chemotherapy. So, it’s not just developing the next drug that would lead to a cure. It’s developing a safer, more efficient drug.”
Creating a new CAR T cell therapy takes time, Dr. Goldberg said. By supporting and protecting his research time, this funding accelerated his findings. As a result, he and his team plan to seek Food & Drug Administration approval in the coming months and launch a clinical trial next year, starting at City of Hope and potentially expanding to multiple sites.
“We’re trying to move the needle for treating solid tumor cancers,” he said. “We’re focused on improved efficacy. But we’re also hopeful that our work will come with other advantages like less chemotherapy and fewer long-term side effects.”
The Pivotal Role of Philanthropy in Changing the Standard of Care
Despite the need for better pediatric cancer treatments, there’s been little work in this area for decades, Dr. Goldberg said. Limited federal funding and little investment from pharmaceutical companies is the crux of the problem.
“In general, pharmaceutical companies are less interested in pediatric research because it’s a very small patient volume,” he said. “That makes our academic work crucially dependent on philanthropic support from organizations like The Sacchi Foundation. Furthermore, the hospital can leverage its drug-manufacturing capabilities and potentially bring this new CAR T cell therapy to more patients in the future.”
“For too long, we’ve been using the same therapies and seeing no differences in outcomes. We’re developing this new CAR T cell therapy because we don’t have the drugs we need for effective treatment. Thanks to this funding, we may be able to give patients who receive this cancer diagnosis more hope.”
— Lior Goldberg, M.D., M.S.,
pediatric oncologist
Ultimately, Dr. Goldberg says, support from The Sacchi Foundation is the engine behind the drive to fulfill an unmet clinical need.