Our research strategy

Research into causes, alleviation and prevention

Because little is known about what causes children to develop leukaemia, we need to find explanations for the increased incidence and develop interventions that can reduce incidence.

Specific objectives:

• To monitor incidence rates of childhood leukaemia
• To develop and maintain a database of all research into the causes of childhood leukaemia
• To use this database to carry out a comprehensive overview of all factors previously linked with childhood leukaemia and to identify useful areas of further research
• To fund world-class research aimed at improving our knowledge of the causes of childhood leukaemia
• To disseminate the results of this research with a view to developing preventive strategies.

Research into treatments

Although more than four out of five of children diagnosed with leukaemia now survive, there are still many children in the UK every year who sadly do not survive.

Those who do survive undergo unpleasant treatment regimes which can themselves cause serious long-term damage to their health and wellbeing.

Specific objectives

• To fund world-class research aimed at developing more effective treatments for childhood leukaemia, with a special focus on those forms which still have a poor prognosis
• To fund research aimed at improving the effectiveness of genetic sub-typing, thus enabling treatment to be scientifically optimised on a case-by-case basis
• To fund research aimed at improving the effectiveness of stem cell transplants
• To fund research aimed at reducing the toxicity and/or long-term unwanted effects of treatment for childhood leukaemia
• To monitor survival and mortality rates
• To fund research into long-term outcomes of treatment