The Division of Pediatric Hematology Oncology

• Ranked #32 in 2015 by the US News and World Report survey

for top Pediatric Hematology/Oncology programs

in the U.S. • [Highest ranked program in

Michigan]

Childhood Cancer • 13,500 new cases are diagnosed each year in

children and teenagers up to the age of 20. • 165 cases per 1,000,000 individuals < 20 yrs. • ~1 in 315 children will develop cancer by the

age of 20. • Every 44 minutes, a child is diagnosed with

cancer in the U.S. • ~36 children and adolescents are diagnosed

with cancer each day. • 180,000 children are diagnosed with cancer

worldwide each year.

Cancer is the leading cause of death from disease of American

children-2,200 die each year.

Surviving and Thriving

Celebration of Life

The Celebration of Life Program at Children’s Hospital of Michigan is one of the largest

Pediatric Cancer Survivor programs in the country. This program is funded by a grant

from Children’s Hospital of Michigan Foundation.

Questions parents ask when their child is diagnosed with cancer.

• Why did my child get cancer? CAUSES • Are there new cancer treatments available for

my child? BETTER TREATMENTS • Are there ways to make treatments safer? IMPROVE OUTCOMES AND QUALITY OF LIFE

• Research is essential for improving the lives and outcomes of our

patients (infants, children, teenagers, young adults) affected by

different cancers and blood disorders.

• In the era of reduced federal government support for medical research (National Institutes of Health), continuing our progress in fighting childhood cancer has become very challenging.

• This factor is also compounded by the fact that childhood cancers represent only 2% of total cancer cases in the U.S. each year and frequently there is a bias in funding research which may only afflict 100’s of children and not thousands of adults.

• Philanthropy and community support have been essential for building and sustaining our mission for conducting research in childhood cancer and improving outcomes.

• This frequently provides seed money for initiating new projects and/or testing hypotheses which can ultimately lead to grant support from outside sources.

How Does One Judge the Quality of Research?

• Our research has been published in many of the leading medical journals in the field including:

Blood, Cancer Research, Nature Genetics, Clinical Cancer Research, Leukemia, Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Pediatric Blood and Cancer, Journal of Psychosocial Oncology, PLoS One, Leukemia & Lymphoma, Oncogene, Journal of Clinical Oncology.

How Does One Judge the Quality of Research?

• Research presented at the annual meetings of the American Society of Hematology, American Association for Cancer Research, American Society of Clinical Oncology, American Society of Pediatric Hematology Oncology, Children’s Oncology Group, American Psychosocial Oncology Society, and the International Society of Pediatric Oncology.

How Does One Judge the Quality of Research?

• Millions of $ in research grants have been obtained over the years from the National Institutes of Health/National Cancer Institute, Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, CureSeach Gerber Foundation, St. Baldrick’s Foundation.

• Local support over the past 35 years of millions of $ from Kids Without Cancer (Leukemia, Research, Life).

• Three endowed chairs in the Division-most of any Division at CHM.

Our Strengths • Multiple physician scientists with a wide range of

clinical interests/expertise. • Multiple PhD scientists associated with our

collaborative institutions at Wayne State University and the Karmanos Cancer Institute.

• Cohesive medical campus with close proximity between the hospital and the various research labs-no geographic barriers for frequent and ongoing interactions and discussions.

• Collaborations outside of Detroit with other leading hospitals and academic institutions (e.g. St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital).

Specialized Pediatric Clinical Diagnostic/Research Labs at

Children’s Hospital • Flow Cytometry Lab (Director-Drs. Savasan

and Ravindranath) • Special Coagulation Lab (Director-Drs. Chitlur

and Rajpurkar) • These are both nationally certified with

expertise in diagnosing pediatric cancer and blood disorders and have served as referral/reference labs for multiple national clinical trials.

Investigators CHM Karmanos WSU Taub Ge Thummel Rajpurkar Matherly Thomason Wang Lum Marusak Yankelevich Albrecht Callaghan Penner Fribley Harper Dombkowski Savasan Ravindranath Chitlur (Coag) Henry Sarnaik (SCA)