Research

In 2011, the St. Baldricks's Foundation, a charity dedicated to raising money for childhood cancer research, awarded Kris Ann P. Schultz, MD, a pediatric oncologist in the cancer and blood disorders program at Children's Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, a $330,000 grant to establish the International Ovarian and Testicular Stromal Tumor (OTST) Registry.

In 1986, Children's hematologist/oncologist Jack Priest, MD, founded the International Pleuropulmonary Blastoma (PPB) Registry to track pleuropulmonary blastoma cases worldwide. PPB is a rare pediatric lung cancer, occurring in 30 to 50 children in the U.S. each year. Today, we continue to gather information from patients diagnosed with PPB from around the world under the direction of Children's hematologist/oncologist Dr. Yoav Messinger, MD.

Children's of Minnesota is a founding member of the cooperative research group, Therapeutic Advances in Childhood Leukemia (TACL), which focuses on developing new treatments for children with a diagnosis of leukemia that recurs after the initial treatment is complete.

The tremendous progress made in pediatric cancer cure rates over the past 50 years came about because treatments for all childhood cancers have been continually improved through research protocols organized internationally by the Children's Oncology Group (COG), an association of institutes dedicated to research in pediatric oncology.

A clinical trial is a research study that seeks to improve upon the currently used best-known treatment. It is done to see if a new treatment is safe and if it works better in treating cancer than the current approach. Clinical trials take place in a clinic or hospital. Most children diagnosed with cancer who are eligible and provide consent to take part, are treated on a clinical trial. If your child participates in a clinical trial, he or she receives certain treatment interventions and are monitored closely over time following treatment.

Study findings presented by Amanda Nickel, Clinical Research Associate I, Research and Sponsored Programs.

Monthly discussion group that reviews a research publication of interest to current PIs, including a review of its methodology and conclusions.