For over 50 years, the Cancer Research Foundation has been funding important laboratory and clinical research projects in Chicago medical centers. Our funding has been earmarked for 1) Bernice Goldblatt Fellows, first-year students in the Cancer Biology M.D., Ph.D. graduate program at the University of Chicago Medical Center, 2) beginning scientists, post M.D./Ph.D. scientists who have never received cancer research funding and need the first "leg-up" in establishing independent research projects and 3) senior scientists whose projects are poised at the threshold of major breakthroughs.

Funding for cancer research has reached a crisis situation," says Joseph B. Kirsner, M.D., Ph.D., the Cancer Research Foundation's leading medical advisor and internationally prominent gastroenterologist. "Because cancer research has become so expensive and sophisticated and federal funding is increasingly limited, there is acute need, particularly at the early stages when support is usually not forthcoming. The Cancer Research Foundation is filling a crucial need in underwriting this research."

The primary source of funding for doctors is the National Cancer Institute, one of the institutes that comprise the National Institutes of Health. But approximately 75% of all approved National Cancer Institute research studies are left unfunded because there is not adequate financial support. This austerity is especially devastating to young researchers, those without previous grant history.

The great challenge is financially supporting the finest scientists involved in bold and innovative cancer research. The mission of the Cancer Research Foundation - to help cure cancer through research - can be the reality, not just the promise.