Our Mission

Our mission is to improve treatment options and find cures for pediatric cancers by funding innovative clinical trials as well as to raise awareness regarding the limited treatment options available to pediatric cancer patients.

Our Reason

Pediatric cancer research is severely underfunded and access to clinical trials is extremely limited as compared to adult cancer patients.

Here are the facts:

• 1 in 285 children will be diagnosed with cancer

• Cancer kills more than 2,500 children in our country every year

• Over 13,500 kids will be diagnosed with cancer in the next 365 days

• Cancer is the number one cause of death by disease among children

• Since 1980, fewer than 10 drugs have been developed for use in children with cancer. Only three drugs have been approved for use in children. Only four additional new drugs have been approved for use by both adults and children.

• Only 4% of federal government cancer research funding goes to study pediatric cancer

• About 60% of all funding for drug development in adult cancers comes from pharmaceutical companies. For kids? Almost none, because childhood cancer drugs are not profitable.

• Pediatric patients wait an average of 6.5 years longer than adults to access new oncology drugs

• A recent study found that:

  • 84.8% of phase 1 and 84.4% of phase 2 trials were open to adults only

  • 14.7% of phase 1 and 15% of phase 2 trials were open to both pediatric and adult patients

  • Notably, just 0.43% of phase 1 and 0.6% of phase 2 trials were open to children only

Sources: National Pediatric Cancer Foundation; Truth 365; St. Baldricks; AJMC

We formed this foundation, in part, to honor the memory of our son, Jake Kestler. Jake survived a Leukemia diagnosis at the age of 7 years old due to a bone marrow transplant from his sister, Lily, who was a perfect match. More than 4 years after returning to a normal life, Jake was diagnosed with Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM), a malignant, stage IV brain tumor. The prognosis for GBM is extremely poor with standard of care treatment. As we began to research and advocate for Jake, we quickly learned that there were extremely limited clinical trial options for pediatrics with GBM as compared to adults.

Through our vigorous research and advocacy, Jake was one of a small number of children to participate in an oncolytic virus clinical trial as well as to receive a cancer vaccine on a compassionate use basis. Sadly, Jake passed away on April 11, 2019 after battling glioblastoma for 2 years and 4 months. Our challenges and experiences throughout this process opened our eyes to the importance of making more innovative, clinical trials available to pediatric cancer patients. There are many foundations that fund cancer research (although pediatric cancer research is perpetually underfunded). However, we are not aware of many foundations that specifically fund clinical trials for pediatrics. The fruits of cancer research need to be made available not only to adults but to children who deserve better outcomes and the potential to grow into adults and live long, happy lives. Trial Blazers for Kids focuses on helping kids get that chance.

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