“Kids shouldn’t have to die of cancer,” says Tamy Bell when asked why Dr. Shawn Beug’s research at CHEO is so important.
Bell, after all, should know: Not only is she a family adviser on CHEO’s patient and family advisory committee, but also a proud multi-way contributor to CN Cycle for CHEO. The event raises money for children’s cancer research at the hospital and is open to teams and individuals across the city.
Bell calls the CN Cycle for CHEO “the best day of the year.” Her 613-member team — known as Griff’s Gang — accounted for $323,469 of the total of $2.1 million raised during 2024’s version of the event.
Funds raised help fund important research conducted by Beug and other clinical investigators at CHEO, on topics from evaluating cardiac late effects in childhood cancer survivors to examining central line dysfunction in children with cancer.
Developing cutting-edge therapies for pediatric brain tumours
Brain cancers are the most common type of cancer in children and adolescents. While current treatments are sometimes successful in the short term, they aren’t always over the long term and come with serious quality-of-life issues.
That’s why Beug’s research at CHEO, which harnesses the body’s own immune system to remove cancer cells, is so important. He and his team aim to isolate immune cells — known as tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes, or TILs — that have entered the tumour, and grow them outside the body to enhance their cancer-fighting abilities before re-introducing them into the patient.
“Brain tumours in children are something where if it’s discovered late or is recurrent, they have limited options,” says the CHEO Research Institute scientist and assistant professor at the University of Ottawa. “What we’re doing is taking advantage of this therapy, which was recently approved in the U.S. by the FDA, for the treatment of melanoma.”
Beug says the goal is to grow immune cells in such a way that they recognize cancer cells and kill or overwhelm their defence mechanisms. He says there’s a group in the U.S. that’s looking at this process to treat pediatric cancer, but that no one else is doing it for pediatric brain tumours.
“It’s extremely high risk, but if it works, it paves the road for what we hope will be a safe and effective therapy,” Beug says, adding that he and his team are still jumping through regulatory hoops. He hopes to do some initial testing on the first patient within a month or so.
“We’ve already trained people in the lab to do this with adult tumours, so this just means adapting the technology for smaller patients,” Beug says. “I want to establish CHEO as a centre for this therapy for pediatric cancer in Canada.”
Life ‘flipped upside down from cancer’
Around 100 kids are diagnosed with cancer at CHEO each year, with around 500 children in active treatment for the disease at any one time.
That’s why the CN Cycle for CHEO is so important: Not only is it one of CHEO’s main fundraising vehicles, but 100 per cent of the funds raised go to oncology care and research devoted to young cancer patients and their families.
CHEO is also a member of the Children’s Oncology Group (COG) international research network, which provides the hospital’s clinical pediatric cancer researchers greater access to funding, treatments, and research support.
Bell, who describes herself as “just a mom whose life was flipped upside down from cancer and wants to help raise some money and awareness,” is also last year’s top fundraiser, having brought in more than $61,000. Her son, Griffin, was diagnosed at 16 months of age with neuroblastoma. He died in March 2024, at the age of six, after a lengthy battle.
Katrina Bussey, vice-president of strategy and communications at the CHEO Foundation, says the event set to begin May 4 at the Canadian War Museum is expected to have around 7,000 participants.
For his part, Beug says he’s “incredibly grateful to the community fundraisers, donors and corporate sponsors for their generosity and support.”
