NF NEWS FA L L 2012
T h e N e w s l e t t e r o f t h e C h i l d r e n ’ s Tu m o r F o u n d a t i o n
Hurricane Sandy Delays Events, But Doesn’t Dampen Spirits In late October, Children’s Tumor Foundation volunteers and staff hoped for the best and prepared for the worst as Hurricane Sandy bore down on the New York tri-state area. With the annual CTF Gala taking place November 1st and a strong NF Endurance Team presence at the New York City Marathon on November 4th, preparations and contingency plans continued in the hopes that both events would take place as planned. However, Hurricane Sandy, as we now know, proved more forceful than expected and caused widespread damage to the NYC area, including loss of life. Closer to home, many Children’s Tumor Foundation volunteers and staff found themselves without power and heat, and in some instances evacuated from their homes. All volunteers and staff are now safe and sound, fortunately.
IN THIS ISSUE From The President................................ 2
NF Endurance Team members, NF Heroes, and CTF staff gather to celebrate their fundraising success despite the NYC Marathon's cancellation.
Hurricane Sandy did directly impact the Foundation in three ways: • The NYC Gala, the Foundation’s premier fundraising event, was postponed until December 6, 2012 • The 2012 NYC Marathon was canceled. • The Foundation’s office in NYC remained closed for two weeks due to damage to the building and lack of power.
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Children’s Tumor Foundation Aims to Make 2013 the Year of Collaboration
Foundation News................................... 3 Research News...................................... 4 Racing4Research................................... 6 NF Endurance........................................ 8 NF Walk................................................. 10 Regional News....................................... 13
G et t he Late st o n NF Email info@ctf.org with your name and contact info to make sure you’re up-todate on NF news and Foundation events. facebook.com/childrenstmrfdn twitter.com/ChildrensTumor
In 2012, the Children’s Tumor Foundation encouraged innovation, as evidenced by the 11 Young Investigator Awards granted this year, and also focused on attracting the pharmaceutical industry to neurofibromatosis (NF) research. As indicated in an interview with Dr. Mark Fischman, President of the Novartis Institute
of Biomedical Research, in the journal, Nature Reviews: Drug Discovery, “An interesting thing about our rare diseases approach is that after we develop a medicine for a rare disease, we realize how many more patients have that disease than we thought when we started. Physicians are reluctant, or perhaps unable, to recognize rare diseases if they continued on page 4