A gift from the Canadian Cancer Society is producing results to OWN.CANCER

Calgary, AB – Jacey Uphill was a bright, beautiful teenager who loved Irish dancing and hoped to become a researcher or doctor. At 16-years-old she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Ewing sarcoma, a rare cancer that forms in the bone or soft tissues and primarily affects children and adolescents. Before her death, in 2012, she shared her dream of raising awareness about childhood cancer.

Her mother Shonalie Biafore is now honouring her daughter’s dream by championing groundbreaking research, funded by the Canadian Cancer Society and donors at the University of Calgary, that offers other people with rare and hard-to-treat cancers and their families new hope.

“It gives me goosebumps. Sometimes I listen to Dr. Douglas Mahoney talk and I cry because I think it would have been wonderful to have these innovate treatments available 12 years ago, for Jacey.”

Shonalie Biafore, Jacey’s mom

Dr. Mahoney, PhD, is a researcher and director of the Riddell Centre for Cancer Immunotherapy within the Arnie Charbonneau Cancer Institute at the Cumming School of Medicine. The immunotherapy treatment developed by Mahoney and his team leverages the body’s own immune cells to fight cancer. The research has been made possible by funding by the Canadian Cancer Society (CCS) and philanthropic donors.

“The Canadian Cancer Society is proud to support impactful immunotherapy research, a frontier of cancer treatment that has tremendous promise for patients.  Thanks to our donors and through our partnership with the University of Calgary, we've invested $9.5M in this research — work that could truly make a difference for people in Canada and around the world.”

Andrea Seale, chief executive officer, Canadian Cancer Society

The CCS donation made through the OWN.CANCER campaign in 2020 has made a substantial impact in the past four years, alongside support from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), BioCanRx, and additional sponsorship from the Canadian Cancer Trials Group which will lead to new clinical trials starting in 2025 at the Arthur J.E. Child Comprehensive Cancer Centre and the Alberta Children’s Hospital.

Some of the work is already underway, one involves treating alveolar soft part sarcoma (ASPS) with chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy. The precision therapy, called GCAR1, is a first-of-its kind made-in-Canada discovery for solid tumours. It works by multiplying and re-engineering a patient’s own immune cells in the lab to better attack the cancer cells then infusing them back into the patient’s body. This offers further treatment options for people with rare cancers that can be difficult to treat with standard of care methods such as chemotherapy or radiation.

“This funding has enabled our research team of clinicians and scientists to push the boundaries of immunotherapy development in an academic setting, directly impacting the lives of patients facing rare and hard-to-treat cancers. Thanks to CCS’s support our team achieved a remarkable milestone — becoming the first in Canada to bring novel CAR T-cell therapy from concept to patient treatment, entirely within the Canadian landscape. CCS’s ongoing support for research continues to help drive the transformation of cancer care, offering new hope and life-saving treatments.”

Dr. Douglas Mahoney, PhD, associate professor, Cumming School of Medicine

The CCS gift helped to enable the design of a new model for developing and producing immunotherapy for rare and hard-to-treat diseases.

“The investment from CCS has been instrumental in advancing immunotherapy research at the Charbonneau Institute,” says Dr. Jennifer Chan, MD, director of the institute. “The Riddell Centre is now a leading research hub dedicated to developing breakthrough immunotherapies for rare and hard-to-treat cancers.”

“Out of something horrible you hope to see something good and I’m inspired by the work UCalgary is doing to help others living with rare cancers,” says Biafore.

Media inquiries

Kelly Johnston
Senior Communications Specialist
Cumming School of Medicine
403-617-8691
kelly.johnston2@ucalgary.ca

About the University of Calgary
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