BRIGHT MINDS. BIG IDEAS.
At the American Cancer Society,
we’re doing everything we can to end cancer.
Bringing together the brightest minds with the biggest ideas. Investing in high-reward projects to find answers faster. Pushing innovation like never before. And getting creative about how we tackle cancer – so we can end cancer as we know it today, making it much more rare and much less deadly.
Creativity and Innovation
Our guiding principles
Creativity
Doing something in a way that’s never been done before – that’s creativity. Without it, progress would be impossible because we’d have nothing new to build on.
Innovation
Improving on what already exists – that’s innovation. Through collective intelligence, we push progress faster, building on the best ideas to make them better.
These essential principles fuel progress.
Here are four unique examples of how creativity and innovation can help push cancer science forward.
CREATIVITY
New test helps spare children with brain cancer from toughest treatments
I got my American Cancer Society grant 4 years ago and it was the predominant grant I used to do all of this work.
“The standard treatment for medulloblastoma, [the most common type of brain tumor in children], includes radiation to the whole brain and spine, as well as surgery and chemotherapy. Unfortunately, radiation to the brain has significant long-term side effects in children. Recent studies have shown that some children can be cured of medulloblastoma using only surgery and chemotherapy. If we are able to identify ahead of time patients whose medulloblastoma was curable with chemotherapy alone, we could spare many children the devastating effects of radiation.”
Thanks to Asgharzadeh, this is now possible. He designed a test that doctors can use to determine which children will benefit most from – or absolutely need – radiation.
INNOVATION
New analyses uncover important trends in colorectal cancer
Our finding that colorectal cancer risk for millennials has escalated back to the level of those born in the late '80s, is very sobering.
American Cancer Society researchers are looking at data in new ways – leading them to discover urgent issues in colorectal cancer.
Recently, they found that new cases of colon cancer and rectal cancer are occurring at an increasing rate among young and middle-aged adults in the US. Once age is taken into account, those born in 1990 have double the risk of colon cancer and quadruple the risk of rectal cancer compared to people born around 1950, when risk was lowest.
They have also found that there are three distinct “hot spots” where death rates from colorectal cancer remain higher compared with the rest of the U.S. – the lower Mississippi Delta, west central Appalachia, and eastern Virginia/North Carolina.
“These areas are characterized by high poverty, which is associated with higher colorectal cancer incidence and death rates. Improvements in the early detection and treatment of cancer disseminate much more slowly in underserved populations.”
CREATIVITY
Ovarian cancer researcher aims to find new treatment
My aunt's experience with ovarian cancer made me interested in researching better ways to diagnose and treat cancer.
Despite the success of targeted therapy in many cancers, single-target drugs have less potential in ovarian cancer. “These tumors are very diverse in their genetic makeup. The primary tumor could be different than the spreading tumors. And recurrent tumors can be different from those two.” Wates is investigating a different approach. She’s looking for a “a compound that kills the tumor based on something it needs to survive,” she says.
With her grant from the American Cancer Society, Wates has a shot at changing the outlook for ovarian cancer – which has a 5-year relative survival rate of 46% and is the leading cause of gynecologic cancer deaths. The work she’s just begun will build on her previous research to find a treatment that is less toxic than current treatments, and
yet kills a broad spectrum of ovarian cancer cells.
INNOVATION
Team merges two treatment types to improve outcomes for patients
Our goal is to bring together two approaches - one targeting the cancer, one targeting the patient - in the most thoughtful way.
More than 35 researchers are working together as part of a Lung Cancer Dream Team to address difficult-to-treat lung cancers – those with a common gene mutation called KRAS, which occurs in 20-30% of lung cancers. There are currently no drugs that attack KRAS.
Researchers are combining their unique specialties and merging two highly promising treatment approaches: targeted therapy and immunotherapy.
“The fact that we have people coming from two completely distinct research backgrounds – one group focused on immunotherapy and the others cancer biologists specializing in targeted therapies – means that this research is not something we could have done separately.”
Science Takes Time
Our future is often defined by our past.
Take, for example, one of the most important discoveries in advancing the treatment and prevention of breast cancer. Identifying the BRCA1 gene in 1990 paved the way for understanding the link between mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes and hereditary breast and ovarian cancers. More than three decades later, we’re building on that science to uncover how mutations in these genes impact the likelihood of responsiveness or resistance to new chemotherapy drugs.
What We’ve Learned About BRCA1 and BRCA2 Since 1950
Future: Breast Cancer Research Continues
The American Cancer Society continues to fund ongoing research into breast cancer risk. This is a major focus for our epidemiology team; they are studying the effect of exercise, weight, and diet on breast cancer risk. We are also funding researchers who are working on understanding the underlying biological mechanisms that cause breast cancer to develop and to spread. And we remain committed to improving treatment and funding research into how mutations in BRCA1 and BRCA2 impact the likelihood of responsiveness or resistance to new chemotherapy drugs.
Science doesn’t only happen in the lab
Our researchers have been collecting and analyzing data from millions of people in the U.S. since the 1950s.
Our largest-ever study, Cancer Prevention Study-II (CPS-II), includes 1.2 million men and women. Begun in 1982, the study continues to lead to new discoveries today – including 650 scientific papers, with findings that have reshaped what we know about preventing cancer.
Cancer Prevention Study II (CPS-II) started in 1982
Beginning in the late 1980s, CPS-II helped to establish the link between obesity and death from breast, colorectal, and other cancers.
In the early 1990s, CPS-II was the first prospective study to find a link between regular aspirin use and lower risk of colorectal cancer. This issue is still being studied today.
Starting in the late 1990s/early 2000s, our studies showed that high red and processed meat and alcohol intake, low physical activity, and longer sitting time increased risk of cancer mortality. These findings contributed to the scientific evidence base for the development of the American Cancer Society Guidelines on Nutrition and Physical Activity for Cancer Prevention. This work continues today.
The Future
Our researchers continue to study data from CPS-II and, in the future, will begin to analyze findings from our newest long-term study, CPS-3, to learn even more about cancer risks.
Some Advances Take Years
They're worth it
In 2014, the cancer death rate for men and women combined fell 25% from its peak in 1991. This decline translates to more than 2.1 million cancer deaths averted.
Significant decline in the cancer death rate
What we're doing right now
Today, we’re investing in cancer research from every angle. We have more than $400 million committed to more than 750 active grants. We’re supporting the work of scientists and health professionals across all aspects of cancer – from basic lab research to bedside patient care.
This investment in cancer research moves the state of the science forward every day – sometimes in small steps and often in large leaps. In 2016 alone, the American Cancer Society’s own team of internal researchers published more than 150 papers, encompassing high-impact insights including connecting exercise with a lower risk of 13 types of cancer for the first time and revealing a worsening racial disparity in breast cancer death rates in women.
We have more to do
While we fund as much cancer science as we can, every year, we have to turn away a significant number of great research ideas due to budget constraints. We need your help to fund more than 200 grants waiting for support. We are more committed than ever to accelerating research, which is why we announced our goal to double our annual funding for research by 2021.