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Where should the Children's Tumor Foundation focus our research efforts in the next five years? If you haven't done so already please complete our Request for Ideas and share your thoughts. Your comments will be taken into consideration as part of our "2011 Strategic Plan for NF Research".  For reference, our 2006 Strategic Plan led to the creation of major new CTF initiatives like the NF Preclinical Consortium and NF Clinic Network.

So tell us what you think! This is you last chance - due date is January 7th!  Follow the link above and Email completed responses to khs@ctf.org.

Major announcements from the National Institutes of Health and Food and Drug Administration bode well for accelerating the development and approval of new drugs as clinical therapies. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Scientific Management Review Board has voted to establish a National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences. The role of this proposed new center would be to establish a focused, integrated, and systematic approach to link basic science research with therapeutics development and clinical care. This has been a missing bridge at the NIH, so this announcement is being very well received.  More.

The Food and Drug Administration, meanwhile, have announced the intention to accelerate drug approvals, issuing new draft guidelines aimed at speeding development work by encouraging joint applications for two drugs simultaneously. Currently, drugs must be approved singly and if joint use is proposed this use must then be separately approved.  "We expect increasing use of combinations," noted Janet Woodcock, director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. "This isn't just true of cancer. It's going to be true of many serious diseases." More.

Following a competitive application process, CTF was selected for the second year in a row to deliver an ‘Innovator’ presentation at the 2010 Partnering for Cures Meeting  - the second annual meeting organized by the Milken Institute to bring together medical research leaders and decision-makers, innovators, and advocates from across sectors, to find workable solutions that will expedite the medical research and development process. Over 800 attendees participated including incoming CTF President  George Orfanakos, who met personally with Milken Institute founder, Michael Milken, to share CTF’s goals and programs; and CTF Chief Scientific Officer Dr. Kim Hunter-Schaedle, who presented ‘The Neurofibromatosis Preclinical Consortium’ as an example of an innovative collaboration between foundations, universities and industry.  The Foundation also met one-on-one with a number of potential partners from the investment, biotech and private sectors. A video of the presentation along with the slides can be viewed here: http://www.partneringforcures.org/2010_innovators/29_neurofib.html

For the second year in a row, the Children's Tumor Foundation neurofibromatosis research programs have been recognized and invited for presentation at the Partnering for Cures meeting, which takes place next week in New York. Chief Scientific Officer Dr. Kim Hunter-Schaedle will present in one of the invited "Innovator" slots on the morning of Wednesday December 15th.  Partnering for Cures is organized by FasterCures, an organization formed under the auspices of the Milken Institute to unite non-profit entities focused on medical research  in a forum for information exchange and building collaborations.   This is the second year of the Partnering for Cures meeting, which aims to drive collaboration between non-profit medical research foundations, the pharma and biotech  industry and federal agencies such as the FDA, and investors, in order to accelerate the identification of cures.  Uniquely, at Partnering for Cures, it is the medical research foundations that take center stage, a recognition of  the increasing central role of foundations in advancing research progress to the clinic. As well as two-days of presentations and panels, the meeting provides  an opportunity for one-on-one meetings between potential future collaborators and partners. The CTF Innovator presentation will showcase the Neurofibromatosis Preclinical Consortium (NFPC) in which candidate drugs are assessed in preclinical models of NF1 and NF2 tumor types. NFPC has led to collaborations with companies including Novartis, Genentech and Avila Therapeutics.  NFPC is CTF's biggest investment since 2008 at over $4M, and which we are set to expand for a further two years at $3.5M 2011-2013.  

Nice mention today for the Foundation in the NY Daily News!  Our Annual Benefit Dinner next week honoring Alexandria Real Estate Equities and CEO Joel Marcus, Dr. Mark Phillips from NYU and this years NF Ambassador Rose Match Suna at the Pierre is shaping up very well.  Read full article at http://bit.ly/bjRcdX

John