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Westmead Children’s Cancer Research Unit

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Local Lions Club Help Flight Children's Cancer 2016

West Pennant Hills-Cherrybrook Lions Club and The NSW Lions Public Health Foundation has donated $15,000 to enable the Westmead Children’s Cancer Research Unit (CCRU) to purchase urgently needed equipment used to treat child cancer patients.

The West Pennant Hills-Cherrybrook Lions Club is a major donor to the CCRU and its donation this year has enabled them to purchase a new refrigerated centrifuge.

The centrifuge machine was desperately needed to replace a machine that had become unuseable through age.

The Research Unit is conducting gene therapy trials on child cancer sufferers and the centrifuge is used to process the patient’s blood. Without a reliable centrifuge the trials cannot proceed.

Gene therapy is being developed by researchers to give young cancer patients improved outcomes and cure rates compared to chemotherapy, which has unpleasant side effects.

The Children’s Hospital at Westmead cares for several hundred young cancer patients every year. Of these, more than half are enrolled in clinical trials that provide access to drugs that have been shown to work. This gives young children and their families new hope using the latest treatments.

The Lions Club’s annual charity raffle raises funds to assist the unit’s equipment needs as well as support the dedicated team of researchers continuing their wonderful work to help kids beat the scourge of cancer. During the presentation ceremony, Professor Jennifer Byrne, on behalf of the scientific team, thanked the Lions for their hard work in raising the funds to help their researchers to improve cancer cure rates. Past president Lion Mohan Nanayakkara thanked the community, sponsors, club members, and the NSW Lions Public Health Foundation for its generous support of the Club’s raffle and other fund raising projects in 2014/15.

Local Lions Club Help Flight Children's Cancer 2014

West Pennant Hills-Cherrybrook Lions Club and The NSW Lions Public Health Foundation has made a donation of $10,729 to enable the Westmead Children’s Cancer Research Unit (CCRU) to purchase urgently needed equipment for the studies and treatments into a common childhood cancer, Neuroblastoma, which is responsible for 15% of all cancer related deaths in children.

The West Pennant Hills-Cherrybrook Club is a major donor to the CCRU. Unfortunately, in half the children patients with neuroblastoma, the tumour is very aggressive and spreads to other parts of the body, even at diagnoses. Two out of three patients die from high-risk neuroblastoma. Currently, the Neuroblastoma Research team is studying the “telomeres” (which protect the DNA of a cell) in this disease. Studying the telomerers in neuroblastoma tumours with different behaviours will help us to understand why some, but not all, of these tumours behave so aggressively. The results of the studies will enable the CCRU to design better treatments to improve the patient cure rate.

During the presentation ceremony, Assoc Prof, Dr. Jennifer Byrne, on behalf of the Unit, thanked the Lions for their hard work in raising the funds from the community. She said that the unit’s scientific team appreciated our donation to assist furthering their work and improving patient treatment outcomes.

Club President, Bob Pillay, said that the Club acknowledged to tremendous importance of raising funds to support the work of the CCRU and the 2014 donation is one of the ways the Club is celebrating its 50th anniversary later this year.

Local Lions Club Help Flight Children's Cancer 2013

West Pennant Hills-Cherrybrook Lions responds to the urgent request of Westmead Children’s Cancer Research Unit to replace their Orbital Shaker Incubators. Ordinary people doing extraordinary things – supporting people with a disability, community greening, fundraising for worthwhile causes. West Pennant Hills-Cherrybrook Lions Club and The NSW Lions Public Health Foundation has responded to an urgent request by the Westmead Children’s Cancer Research Unit to replace their Orbital Shaker Incubators. Their old machines simply wore out and without the replacements important cancer research projects would have to be postponed.

The new Orbital Incubators are used by researchers to isolate and grow specific genes thought to be involved in causing cancer. The machines grow different genes in bacterial cells, which each carry unique genes that are placed in them. Bacteria are grown in the incubators and when researchers have a container full they isolate the gene of interest from the bacteria , which allows them to essentially make unlimited quantities of specific genes to study how they are expressed in cancers.

The Club’s President, Mr. Alan Penney, presented a cheque for $12,590 to the Research Unit’s Head, Assoc Professor Jennifer Bryne. He said that the Lions Club continues to be a major donor to the Cancer Unit’s work, having donated over $63,000 in recent years to assist the survival rate of young children patients. President Penney added that, as the equipment did not qualify for government funding, the Westmead Research Unit is reliant on community volunteer organizations like Lions International to provide vital equipment for ongoing research. He urged other community groups to follow his Club’s example and help support Children’s cancer research.

During the presentation ceremony, Assoc Prof, Dr. Jennifer Byrne, on behalf of the Unit, thanked the Lions for their hard work in raising the funds from the community. She said that the unit’s scientific team appreciated our donation to assist furthering their work and improving patient treatment outcomes.