• Home
• Research
• Virgin London Marathon
• adidas Silverstone Half Marathon & Bupa London 10,000
• Register

About the Bob Champion Cancer Trust

The Bob Champion Cancer Trust has built in conjunction with the Institute of Cancer Research the first male dedicated research facility in Europe. In the UK it has been estimated that one in every 14 men will develop prostate cancer. The incidence of this disease is also increasing and, within the next decade, is set to overtake colon cancer and even lung cancer to become the more common cancer in men. Prostate cancer, therefore, represents a major national health problem.

For many cancers the fundamental mechanism of cancer development have been unravelled. Such studies reveal that the disease develops because of alterations or mutations within ‘cancer genes’. Although cancer genes responsible for the development of, for example, colon cancer and breast cancer have been identified, none of the genes responsible for the development of prostate cancer have been found. This is bad news for sufferers of prostate cancer because cancer genes, once found, can be used to aid treatment and act as targets for new drugs.

We do know that the development of prostate cancer can be genetic and that it runs in families. However, again the cancer genes responsible for prostate cancer families have not been identified. Much more research needs to be carried out in this important area.

Each year in the UK of the 32,000 men, who will be diagnosed with prostate cancer, 11,000 can expect to die from their disease. Significant improvements, therefore, also need to be made in the treatment of this disease.

The reason for our poor performance in understanding and treating this cancer is not difficult to find. Quite simply very little funding is spent on prostate cancer research. If we are to continue contributing to the fight against prostate cancer we need to continue raising funds to support our research team within our laboratories.

This team is focused in understanding the detailed or molecular basis of development of prostate cancer. Success of this research will ultimately lead to the development of better clinical management of prostate cancer and to new prostate cancer treatments.