The Institute of Cancer Research shared a post on LinkedIn:
‘The reality that I could really do something useful against the disease that killed my mother is really quite thrilling.’
Professor Paul Workman, our former chief executive, was 37 and already well established as a cancer researcher when his mother, Ena, died aged 68 from chordoma, a rare bone tumour.
About one in a million people are affected by the disease, for which there are no targeted drug treatments.
‘Thirty-six years ago, there was nothing we could do to treat chordoma beyond radiotherapy and surgery. There was little understanding of the disease and no approved drugs were available to help my mother. It was really painful at the time, and it has absolutely motivated me ever since.’
Paul and his colleagues, working as part of an international collaboration, recently pinpointed a key protein, known as brachyury, which they realised was crucial to the growth of chordoma cancer cells in a patient’s body.
Our researchers are dedicated to tackling cancers that continue to have very poor survival rates, including rare cancers and those that are harder to treat.”
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