May is Brain Tumor Awareness Month and we want you to Go Gray in May! This year, every donation made to Head for the Cure during May will be matched in honor and memory of Gary Lichtenstein. He was diagnosed with brain cancer in March of 2003 and after a valiant battle passed away in October of the same year. Our goal this year is to raise $15,000 and with this generous matching donor, we could raise $30,000 for brain cancer research and programs!
Funds raised through this year’s Go Gray in May campaign will support an exciting project that continues to fulfill our promise to provide further support to the pediatric brain tumor community.
DMG/DIPG international patients that enroll in PNOC22 or PNOC23 will be offered sequencing through the MI-ONCOSEQ program at the University of Michigan. In addition to providing a “clinical sequencing” panel of 1,700 genes to families and clinicians, Dr. Carl Koschmann and the MI-ONCOSEQ team will be performing research-grade whole genome sequencing (WGS) of tumor and germline samples from these patients. This clinical and research sequencing will find novel markers of response and resistance in these tumors as well as provide patient-specific mutations in mitochondrial DNA that will be used for tumor monitoring in liquid (CSF and plasma) samples.
“This five-year project of clinical and research sequencing is currently funded at about 25% of its goal, leaving an important gap in the information available to researchers looking to find novel markers of response and resistance in these tumors. Funding from the Head for the Cure Foundation is essential to allowing this program to be carried out at the scale and pace necessary to maximize discovery and cutting edge patient care.” – Dr. Koschmann, Pediatric Neuro-Oncologist at the University of Michigan
Additional information about the study can be found here.