Ependymoma Research Foundation
We are a, volunteer-run, nonprofit organization. The organization was started by Jeff and Samarrah Clayman. Jeff Clayman, MD, FACC, Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine at Tufts Medical School is a Cardiologist at the Lahey Clinic, and Samarrah is a Social Worker and Writer. In addition, we have a professional board of directors with robust experience in medicine, research, fundraising, law and nonprofit administration.
Dr. Clayman is uniquely qualified to head a research foundation given his ability to critically assess and prioritize research activities so that any research monies allocated will move us closer to our goal of identifying a biochemical target which could be utilized for drug development.
The Ependymoma Research Foundation is run efficiently with low overhead and has an entirely volunteer staff. No donations received are used for overhead to ensure that what is raised is actually applied to research projects. The main geographical focus for research is planned to be in the Boston area to take advantage of the areas vast talent pool in drug development, university research facilities and graduate training programs. All labs the utilize foundation funds are actively followed to determine if research produced is likely to result in a progression towards a cure for Ependymoma.
The Ependymoma Research foundation recognizes that ependymoma has been a chronically underfunded area and that more basic research is badly needed in this area. Much of recent clinical research has focused on repurposing existing anti neoplastic drugs, an approach that has largely been met with failure. For this reason, the Ependymoma Research foundation prioritizes upstream research that would be otherwise overlooked by the NIH R01 grant process that may either provide direct mechanistic insight into ependymoma or provide the preclinical data necessary to move a therapeutic agent or idea out of the lab and into a Phase I clinical trial or to have adequate scientific rationale to actually qualify for R01 NIH grant funding on its own. We fund projects internally but also help others who raise money on their own find projects that may lead to new and effective treatments for ependymoma. We fully integrate anyone interested in raising money for research in the proposal review process with the scientific guidance of our foundation. We base our funding decisions on the constant and unremitting review of any and all peer reviewed research related to ependymoma.
As important as it is to find a medical treatment for ependymoma, the foundation also has a core belief that training future scientists and raising the scientific awareness and interest in the disease is the best solution to ensure that progress is made in the future. To that end, the foundation directs support whenever possible to investigators in the early stages of professorship or in fellowship training.
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All profits from the purchase of the book will be directed to pediatric brain tumor research.