Speakers
Dr Paula Adkin
The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust
Paula Adkin is a Specialty Doctor in Paediatric, Teenage & Young Adult Long-Term Follow-Up at The Royal Marsden Hospital in Sutton. She has research interests in Pelvic Radiation Disease and radiation-induced splenic dysfunction and is completing her MD(Res) at The Institute of Cancer Research.
Dr Assunta Albanese
The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust
Dr Assunta Albanese
FRCPCH Mphil
Dr Assunta Albanese is an experienced Paediatric Endocrinologist who has been helping children and young people with hormone-related conditions for over 20 years. She trained in Medicine and Paediatrics at the University of Florence in Italy and later spent three years as a Research Fellow at London’s Institute of Child Health, where she developed her expertise in growth and puberty disorders.
In 1999, she became a Consultant at St George’s and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, where she leads the Long term Endocrine Service, supporting children who have recovered from cancer. Her work focuses on a wide range of conditions, including growth and puberty disorders, diabetes insipidus, and hormonal complications in cancer survivors.
Dr Albanese is a passionate teacher, training both medical students and junior doctors, and she holds a formal qualification in medical education. Beyond her clinical and teaching work, she’s a dedicated researcher, having published nearly 900 articles and book chapters and contributed to over 70 abstracts. She has played a leading role in multiple research projects.
She’s a regular speaker at national and international conferences, where she shares her knowledge and experience with professionals worldwide. Dr Albanese’s career is all about improving care for children with complex endocrine issues and advancing the field of paediatric endocrinology.
Professor John Anderson
University College of London
John Anderson is Professor of Experimental Paediatric Oncology at the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health and Honorary Consultant Paediatric Oncologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital London. He graduated in Biochemistry from the University of Oxford and in Medicine from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. He trained in paediatrics and paediatric oncology in London and completed his PhD in cancer biology at the Institute of Cancer Research, Sutton UK in 1998. Since then, he has been a group leader at the UCL Institute of Child Health. Since around 2005, his research group’s focus has been on childhood solid cancer immunology and immunotherapy with a particular interest in translating early findings into clinical trials, for example through T cell engineering and T cell adoptive immunotherapy. He works in several collaborative research and clinical collaborative groups including the SIOPEN neuroblastoma trials network, the UK Children’s Cancer and Leukaemia Group, and the ITCC solid tumour committee.
Dr Rochelle Bagatell
Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Professor Bagatell is a paediatric oncologist at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where she serves as the Solid Tumour Section Chief. Her clinical and research interest is in neuroblastoma. She has more than 20 years of experience caring for children with neuroblastoma and their families and sees a large number of neuroblastoma patients in her clinical practice, including those being treated in the frontline setting and those with refractory or relapsed disease.
She has conducted key trials of new therapies for patients with neuroblastoma and collaborates extensively with laboratory investigators to learn as much as possible about mechanisms of response and resistance following therapy from patients who enrol on clinical studies. She is currently the chair of the Children’s Oncology Group Neuroblastoma Committee and is also the chair of the US National Comprehensive Cancer Center (NCCN) Guidelines Committee for Neuroblastoma.
Dr Sally George
The Institute of Cancer Research, London
Dr Sally George is a Consultant Paediatric Oncologist at The Royal Marsden Hospital and a Group Leader at The Institute of Cancer Research (ICR). After completion of her clinical training, she completed a laboratory-based PhD at the ICR, focused on identifying novel therapeutic options for a group of patients with high-risk neuroblastoma with poor outcomes. She then undertook a postdoctoral research position at The Francis Crick Institute before returning to ICR to set up her independent research team.
Dr George is an active member of the SIOPEN Biology and New Drug Development groups. She is also the Chief Investigator of the ‘MINT’ early phase clinical trial (MIBG in Neuroblastoma with Talazoparib) which will open in the UK, Netherlands, Germany, and Canada in 2025. She also played an instrumental role in setting up the UK National SMPaeds programme, which offers sequencing tests to children with cancer at the time of relapse or disease progression.
Dr Meredith Irwin
The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto
Professor Irwin was appointed Chief of Paediatrics at The Hospital for Sick Children (‘Sick Kids’) and Professor and Chair of the Department of Paediatrics at the University of Toronto in 2020. She received her MD from Harvard Medical School and completed Paediatrics and Oncology training at Boston Children’s Hospital and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. She joined the Haematology/Oncology Division at Sick Kids as a Clinician-Scientist in 2002. Professor Irwin became the inaugural Director of the Sick Kids Neuroblastoma program in 2008 and Solid Tumour Section Head from 2011-2020.
Her research focuses on the genes and pathways that regulate cell death and metastasis in neuroblastoma, and the identification of biomarkers to optimize risk classification and precision medicine approaches for neuroblastoma. Dr Irwin is a member of the International Neuroblastoma Risk Group (INRG) and Children’s Oncology Group (COG) Neuroblastoma Executive Committees and is Chair of the COG Biology Subcommittee where she is involved in the development of current and future North American clinical trials for neuroblastoma patients.
Dr Gudrun Schleiermacher
Institut Curie, Paris
Gudrun Schleiermacher is a paediatric oncologist and researcher and works as a physician-scientist at Institut Curie, Paris, France, where she is Delegate Director for Translational Research of the SIREDO Integrated Paediatric Oncology Center, and a group leader of the INSERM-labelled RTOP (Translational Research in Paediatric Oncology) team. She is member of the SIOPEN executive committee, chair of the SIOPEN Translational Steering Committee, and chair of the SIOPEN Biology Committee.
In addition to care for children and adolescents with cancer, she is involved in clinical and translational research programmes. Her work focusses the study of molecular mechanisms involved in cancer progression and clonal evolution in neuroblastoma and other paediatric cancers, based on biomarker studies using liquid biopsies and on single cell analysis. Future aims are to integrate biomarkers into integrative treatment approaches, while working towards a better understanding of the underlying genetic and epigenetic modifications involved in the oncogenesis and tumour progression. She is also involved in personal and precision medicine approaches at a national and international level.
Professor Juliet Gray
The Cancer Immunology Centre, University of Southampton
Professor Juliet Gray is a Paediatric Oncologist at Southampton Children’s Hospital, and also leads a research group at the Cancer Immunology Centre, University of Southampton. She has expertise in immunotherapies for neuroblastoma, and her laboratory research focuses on improving anti-GD2 therapies, by understanding better how they work and combining them with other drugs. She also leads a number of early-phase clinical immunotherapy trials, including MINivAN and BEACON-2.
Juliet plays a key role in both UK and European neuroblastoma research, and is the chair of the UK Neuroblastoma group and Vice President of the European Research Network (SIOPEN. She is also a member of the UK National Neuroblastoma Advisory Panel and Solving Kids Cancer’s Scientific Advisory Board.
Helen Pearson
Solving Kids' Cancer UK
Helen has worked in paediatric oncology for over sixteen years, having worked in the NHS and private sector. She has a master's degree in advanced Practice in Cancer Care and a Post-Graduate Diploma Advanced Nurse Practitioner. For her doctoral studies Helen developed and led the REDMAPP research study which explored parent treatment decision-making in relapsed and refractory neuroblastoma. The knowledge gained informed the development of a website to support parents in making these decisions, which was developed in partnership with parents. Helen was the first paediatric oncology nurse to receive the National Institute for Health and Care Research Clinical Doctoral Research Fellowship which funded her doctoral studies. She has published with nursing and medical colleagues, co-authoring a chapter on treatment decision-making with colleagues internationally for a paediatric oncology nursing textbook, and contributed to the Neuroblastoma textbook which is due to be published in 2025.
Helen is a member of the MiNivAn Trial Steering Committee, CCLG Research Advisory Group, the SIOP Young Investigators Education Committee, and the SIOPE nurses research group. She has previously been a member of the European Oncology Nursing Society Advocacy working group. Helen is the founder and Chair of the National Neuroblastoma Nursing Group which was initiated to increase partnership working amongst nurses nationally caring for children with neuroblastoma and is co-chair of the CCLG/RCN Children and Young People’s Nursing Group.
Dr Steven DuBois
Boston Children's
Pediatric Oncologist, Harvard Medical School
Dr DuBois completed medical school and pediatric training at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He completed pediatric oncology training at Dana-Farber / Boston Children’s Hospital and obtained a Master of Science in Epidemiology from the Harvard School of Public Health. He is currently an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. He is the Director of Experimental Therapeutics at Dana-Farber / Boston Children’s Cancer and Blood Disorders Center where he leads a program designed to bring new targeted therapies to children with cancer.
Dr DuBois leads an active clinical and translational research program focused on patients with advanced neuroblastoma and Ewing sarcoma. He conducts clinical trials of novel targeted agents relevant to these diseases, including national phase 1, 2, and 3 clinical trials. He also studies new biomarkers that improve our understanding of the biology of pediatric solid tumors and of the pharmacodynamic effects of targeted therapies.
Dr DuBois has served on a number of national committees, including the Children’s Oncology Group (COG) Neuroblastoma Steering Committee, COG Bone Tumor Committee, the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Scientific Program Committee, and the US FDA Pediatric Oncology Drugs Advisory Committee (ODAC).
Matt White
Parent & Trustee, Solving Kids' Cancer UK
Matt White first became involved with the charity in 2009 when his son Felix was diagnosed with high-risk neuroblastoma.
The family were treated at the Royal Marsden in Sutton before going on to Germany for antibody treatment and, when Felix relapsed, the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia for therapy as part of a clinical trial. Sadly, Felix passed away in 2011.
Four years later in 2015, Matt became a Trustee of the charity. He lives in Brighton with his wife, Colleen, and their three other children. He works as a Management Consultant, and in his spare time volunteers for the Samaritans. He also does triathlons and open-water swimming, none of which he’s particularly good at but it gets him out of the house (he tells us)!
“This charity means a great deal to me and always will. It was always there just when we needed it, giving our family support, educating us on potential paths to take and paving the way for potentially life-saving treatment for Felix. I want to help ensure that other families who face this terrible disease can have the same access to the brilliant support from Solving Kids' Cancer UK that we did.
“Despite what eventually happened to our beautiful boy, I have never given up hope, and never will.
“As a Trustee, my focus is to support the charity’s strategic clarity and its ability to raise much needed operational funds. We have a brilliant team doing incredibly important work and it’s critical that we raise and sustain enough finance year on year to help this continue.”
Hosts & moderators
Professor John Anderson
University College of London
John Anderson is Professor of Experimental Paediatric Oncology at the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health and Honorary Consultant Paediatric Oncologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital London. He graduated in Biochemistry from the University of Oxford and in Medicine from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. He trained in paediatrics and paediatric oncology in London and completed his PhD in cancer biology at the Institute of Cancer Research, Sutton UK in 1998. Since then, he has been a group leader at the UCL Institute of Child Health. Since around 2005, his research group’s focus has been on childhood solid cancer immunology and immunotherapy with a particular interest in translating early findings into clinical trials, for example through T cell engineering and T cell adoptive immunotherapy. He works in several collaborative research and clinical collaborative groups including the SIOPEN neuroblastoma trials network, the UK Children’s Cancer and Leukaemia Group, and the ITCC solid tumour committee.
Dr Cormac Owens
Children's Health Ireland
Cormac Owens is a paediatric oncologist and is the clinical lead of the Cancer Clinical Trials Unit at Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) in Dublin. He has been involved in the set up and conduct of paediatric oncology clinical trials run at CHI since 2013. He has been involved in the trial design and conduct of several multinational trials, including the BEACON-neuroblastoma, SIOPEN HR2, and BEACON2 trials.
Cormac is the current vice-president of SIOPEN, a member of the SIOPEN executive committee, past treasurer of SIOPEN and the current chair of the SIOPEN New Drug Development Committee. He is leading the SIOPEN high-risk task force which will develop the HR3 clinical trial to replace HR2.
He is an active member of the Innovative Therapies for Children with Cancer Consortium (ITCC), with a special interest in solid tumour trial design and early phase clinical trials for neuroblastoma. Cormac is the co-chair of SIOPE’s Clinical Research Council, representing the European Clinical Trial Groups and a board member of SIOPE.
Helen Pearson
Solving Kids' Cancer UK
Helen has worked in paediatric oncology for over sixteen years, having worked in the NHS and private sector. She has a master's degree in advanced Practice in Cancer Care and a Post-Graduate Diploma Advanced Nurse Practitioner. For her doctoral studies Helen developed and led the REDMAPP research study which explored parent treatment decision-making in relapsed and refractory neuroblastoma. The knowledge gained informed the development of a website to support parents in making these decisions, which was developed in partnership with parents. Helen was the first paediatric oncology nurse to receive the National Institute for Health and Care Research Clinical Doctoral Research Fellowship which funded her doctoral studies. She has published with nursing and medical colleagues, co-authoring a chapter on treatment decision-making with colleagues internationally for a paediatric oncology nursing textbook, and contributed to the Neuroblastoma textbook which is due to be published in 2025.
Helen is a member of the MiNivAn Trial Steering Committee, CCLG Research Advisory Group, the SIOP Young Investigators Education Committee, and the SIOPE nurses research group. She has previously been a member of the European Oncology Nursing Society Advocacy working group. Helen is the founder and Chair of the National Neuroblastoma Nursing Group which was initiated to increase partnership working amongst nurses nationally caring for children with neuroblastoma and is co-chair of the CCLG/RCN Children and Young People’s Nursing Group.
Dr Lucas Moreno
Vall d'Hebron Barcelona Hospital Campus
Dr Lucas Moreno is a paediatric oncologist dedicated to early phase clinical trials and neuroblastoma. He trained in La Fe Hospital (Valencia, Spain), and started his career in the Royal Marsden Hospital (London, UK) back in 2008, under the mentorship of Professor Andy Pearson.
In April 2013, he created the Clinical Research Unit for Paediatric Phase I/II Trials at Hospital Niño Jesús in Madrid, Spain, a centre that is part of the Innovative Therapies for Children with Cancer (ITCC) European consortium, and focuses on the design and development of first-in-child phase I trials and early clinical trials of molecularly targeted agents and immunotherapeutics. Dr Moreno was recently appointed Clinical Director of Paediatric Oncology and Haematology at Vall d'Hebron Barcelona Hospital Campus.
Dr Moreno is the international Chief Investigator of the randomised phase 2 trial BEACON-Neuroblastoma open in 10 European countries for refractory/relapsed neuroblastoma, and has participated in the development of more than 30 early phase clinical trials for paediatric cancers. He has led the development of pharmacodynamic biomarkers for PI3K inhibitors in neuroblastoma which are now ready to be implemented in early clinical trials. He is also invited investigator at the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (CNIO) and is running several projects in neuroblastoma drug development.
Dr Moreno chairs the Drug Development Group and is a member of the Executive Committee of the European Neuroblastoma Network (SIOPEN), and is a member of the Clinical Trials Committee of the ITCC consortium.
Gail Jackson
Solving Kids' Cancer UK
Gail joined Solving Kids’ Cancer UK in April 2020 as the charity’s CEO. Gail is passionate about working for organisations with children at its heart and this is what led her to Solving Kids’ Cancer UK.
Gail has a wealth of experience in supporting children and families, having started her career as a children’s social worker. Gail has held senior leadership positions within regional and national charities and was CEO of a regional community development charity.
Gail lives in rural Lincolnshire with her husband, two teenage children, two dogs and four hens.
Hayley Blackwell
Solving Kids' Cancer UK
Hayley is always on hand to provide support to families throughout their child's cancer journey.
She has been through this with her own daughter, Eva. Eva was diagnosed with high-risk neuroblastoma in 2014 and is now over eight years in remission, thriving after being successfully treated in the UK.
She is ideally placed to guide other families.
Away from work, Hayley enjoys music festivals and travelling. She also volunteers for the Make-A-Wish Foundation as a wish visitor.