Hello friends of the AGCF.

September 1st is the start of Gynae cancer awareness month for 2024, we invite you to join with us to fundraise as we go purple for Gynae cancer. 

Thank you for your generous support to AGCF's research funding so far, and for raising awareness of the 8 gynae cancers across the country.

Your combined efforts have enabled world class research projects and brilliant minds to develop improved tests, detection, and treatments. You've given hope to women with cancer, their families and friends.

This year, we're inviting you to host fun events to raise research funds with your family, friends, pets, workmates, clubs or communities, on any day in September. From hosting morning teas with purple cakes, purple hat lunches, purple nail painting parties - with your mates - or wearing cheeky vulva or ovary socks from our sponsors, Sydney Sock Project or raising a glass of Ms Gina Gin or purple grape juice with your friends! To donate, visit the AGCF website.

Do send us your purple event pics - people, pets, nails, feet, hats, food - to info@agcf.org.au with a brief description, and we'll post them on AGCF's social media.  We're partnering with Overport, one of the very best in socials, to help us promote gynae cancer awareness month across Australia. 

At AGCF we won't lose sight of the impact of gynae cancer affected lives, for Jeannie, Merle, Annette, Carmen, Cindy, Kayla, Sally, Megan, and sadly Rosaleen, whose legacy we keep, for Danielle, Amelia, Kaye and Corinne, and the many more brave women who inspire us daily. Or, that every 1.3 hours a woman in Australia is diagnosed with a gynae cancer, with a total of 7000 new cases each year. Sadly, not all will survive to lead long lives. 

We thank you for your support to fund research for a brighter future, sharing hope.  💜

Kind regards,

Diane Langmack OAM, Chair

Leonie Young MAICD, CEO AGCF

Congratulations to Assoc Professor Dr Liz Caldon PhD, of the Garvan Institute, who received the AGCF 2024 Carmen Duncan Memorial Gynae Cancer Research Fellowship Award from Carmen's daughter, Amelia Barrett, and her brother Duncan. 

The Board of AGCF is delighted to welcome Amelia Barrett as an Ambassador. Amelia has had a long association with AGCF, as the daughter and carer for her mum, the late Carmen Duncan (1942-2019), who died from an aggressive gynae cancer.

Carmen was an Australian-born stage and screen actor, whose stellar career, locally and internationally, spanned 50 years. Carmen was a beloved mother, grandmother and sister who bravely fought and survived breast, bowel and thyroid cancers. She ultimately died of vaginal cancer – a rare disease that represents only 1-2% of gynaecological cancers.

Carmen was passionately supportive of gynae cancer research and helped to raise nearly $2 million for the Royal Hospital for Women Foundation's GO Research Fund in the early 2000's. She was equally supportive of the establishment of the AGCF in 2011, of the need to raise research funds to find a cure. Carmen became an Ambassador in the years before her death in 2019 to help AGCF raise awareness of gynae cancers and the impact on women and their families.

Amelia has been influential in assisting the AGCF to maintain her mother's legacy and to establish the Carmen Duncan Memorial Research Fellowship 2024, with donations from family and friends, coupled with a NSW Government grant to AGCF for the 2 year Fellowship.

Amelia shares her moving experience as a daughter watching her beloved mum battle the insidious vaginal cancer in the AGCF Awareness video, www.agcf.org.au.

It is so difficult for everyone involved in the circumstances when the person you love is struggling with their cancer battle and decides to cease treatment. It came as a complete shock, hard to reconcile….In the end my brother and I told our mother, we love you and we're here for you and we respect your decision. And we comforted her, and she us, through the end stages.

I can't stress enough how important it is for women to keep a check on our bodies where gynae cancer is concerned; we're often misdiagnosed, under-diagnosed, or not diagnosed early enough, early treatment is the key to recovery.

Thank you Amelia for your ongoing efforts to assist the AGCF with the establishment of the Carmen Duncan Memorial Research Fellowship 2024 and by generously sharing your experiences as a carer in the Awareness video.

We sincerely thank the Canterbury Bulldogs RLC Chairman, board members and CEO for hosting the Sport Supports Science - Saving Women's Lives Lunch earlier this year. Particular thanks to Gus Gould, Football General Manager & proud AGCF Ambassador, Anthony Maroon, MC, Richard C, Auctioneer, David & Paul, NSWRL, Harvey Norman, Zeid from Qatar Airlines, Rob & Lee from UL, Prof Hacker, the WayInNetwork Ladies, Ambassadors and attendees on the day. 🚺💜

The most important advance in the management of patients with advanced ovarian cancer over the past 15 years has been the introduction of a new class of drugs called PARP inhibitors.

PARP stands for Poly-ADP-ribose-polymerase, (where ADP stands for adenosine diphosphate). PARP are a group of enzymes that help repair DNA after it has been damaged. DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is the molecule that carries the genetic code within each individual cell in the body and carries all the information necessary to maintain the life and integrity of cells. DNA can be damaged by exposure to ultraviolet light, radiation, environmental toxins and anticancer drugs. It needs to be repaired if damaged or the cells will die.

PARP inhibitors were first shown to be effective in patients with breast or ovarian cancers caused by mutations in the BRCA genes, the most common cause of hereditary breast and ovarian cancers. The proteins produced by the BRCA genes are responsible for repairing DNA damage through a process called homologous repair. BRCA associated cancers have a deficiency in homologous repair (HRD) and rely on other less efficient methods to repair DNA damage. This proves to be their "Achilles heel". DNA damage is mainly repaired by the PARP enzymes in those cancers with HRD and if these enzymes are blocked by PARP inhibitors, the cancer cells will die.

This is a very good example of what is termed "targeted therapy", as PARP inhibitors can selectively kill cancer cells which occur in people with inherited BRCA mutations as well as with other causes of HRD. About 50% of high-grade serous and endometrioid ovarian cancers have HRD, either due to mutations in BRCA genes or to a variety of other causes, and these cancers are potentially sensitive to PARP inhibitors. All patients with ovarian cancer are routinely offered genetic testing to identify BRCA mutations, and their cancers are also tested for HRD to identify who is most likely to benefit from PARP inhibitors.

The most effective approach is to use PARP inhibitors as maintenance treatment for 2-3 years after surgery and chemotherapy. The first study of the use of PARP inhibitors as maintenance therapy following response to first line chemotherapy was the SOLO1 trial, which was published in 2018. This and subsequent studies have resulted in a paradigm shift in the management of patients with advanced high-grade serous and endometrioid ovarian, fallopian tube and peritoneal cancers with HRD. In the SOLO1 trial, there was a 70% reduction in the risk of disease progression or death with the use of the PARP inhibitor Olaparib for 2 years versus a placebo after completion of first line chemotherapy. After 7 years of follow up, almost 50% of patients treated with Olaparib versus 20% on placebo were alive without evidence of recurrence. This was an unprecedented response rate and a major advance. There are two PARP inhibitors approved in Australia, Olaparib and Niraparib.

As a result of this trial, maintenance therapy with PARP inhibitors is now considered to be standard of care for patients with advanced stage, high-grade serous or endometrioid ovarian cancers following response to chemotherapy, rather than deferring their use to the time of recurrence.

PARP inhibitors are generally well tolerated, but can be associated with nausea, vomiting, fatigue and suppression of the bone marrow. It is usual to continue PARP maintenance therapy for 2-3 years depending on the PARP inhibitor used. Since the introduction of PARP inhibitors, the 5-year survival for ovarian cancer in Australia has risen from 42% to 49%.

Prof. Neville Hacker.

Three new AGCF A4 posters for Gynae Cancer awareness promotion, available to download from our website.

With thanks and update for September 2024.

As the calendar moves to Springtime, more sunshine and 🌸 🌺, I write to thank you for your ongoing support to AGCF, and to invite you to go purple for Gynae cancer awareness with us throughout September, as we step up to raise awareness and funding for life saving and life extending gynae cancer research.   

Raising awareness of the eight gynae cancers - vulval, vaginal, cervical, uterine/endometrial, fallopian, ovarian, placental, and peritoneal - and seeking support for greater investment in breakthrough gynae research are core to AGCF's activities. They are also key commitments we make to the 7000 women diagnosed with gynae cancers each year in Australia.

AGCF's fundraising, with your help, provides two-year research grants for the most brilliant young post-doctoral researchers in this field.  They have ideas we call blue sky research. We believe their unrestrained, often imaginative ideas are at the forefront to find a breakthrough to provide women stricken by these cancers with a greater chance of longer term survival, even a cure.

I am proud to share that, in August, with support from the NSW Government and the Duncan Family, the AGCF awarded its fourth Fellowship, the 2024 Carmen Duncan Memorial Gynaecological Research Fellowship to an outstanding researcher, Assoc Prof Dr Liz Caldon PhD, from the Garvan Institute, for her project: identifying drivers of resistance to PARP inhibitors in ovarian cancer. The report and pics of the event are in the newsletter, together with an article by AGCF's Prof Hacker, on the significant breakthroughs gained in using PARP inhibitors to treat ovarian and peritoneal cancers this past decade.

The AGCF team shares its research and web, e-linkages, www.agcf.org.au with many cancer researchers and policy organisations. These include Cancer Australia, Ovarian Cancer Australia, Rare Cancers Australia, the NSW Cancer Institute and the 8 Cancer Councils; all linking women and their families with the latest research evidence, information and support.  Importantly, AGCF also continues to lobby parliamentarians and governments for more equitable research funding, to improve early diagnosis and treatment options for women with gynae cancer.

Although we're only half way through the go purple for Gynae cancer month, there have been many purple promo's held, across the country, from Forestville WA, to The Hall Ladies lunch club at Gold Creek ACT, to Queanbeyan and Grenfell NSW, and to Brisbane Qld. All purple themed events and personal stories are welcome, do continue to send us your fun purple pics to info@agcf.org.au and we'll post them on socials and the website.💜🚺

The AGCF team thanks donor friends and families for your ongoing support, helping us raise awareness of the 8 gynae cancers and their impact. Your combined efforts have enabled world class research projects and brilliant minds to develop improved tests, diagnoses and treatments like the PARPi. You've given hope to women with cancer, their families and friends. Sadly, not all women with gynae cancer will survive to lead long lives.

We give tribute and share beautiful memories of Merle, Carmen, Kaye, Megan, Annette, Rosaleen and the many, many women, their families and friends, who have urged the AGCF to double our efforts in researching for a cure. They bravely shared their cancer journeys with us so that people can take hope and inspiration from their experiences.  Rosaleen featured in our previous newsletter and website, on her diagnosis and journey with MMMT, a rare gynae cancer, and she selflessly shared updates throughout her palliative care.  It was a privilege to help Rosaleen share her story. Sadly, Rosaleen passed away in August, Vale Rosaleen.💜

We know that research is the proven key to saving lives and extending survival rates, and, with your help, we look forward to calling for applications for the 2025 AGCF Fellowship Awards.💜🚺Gynae cancer research = breakthrough results = survivorship = hope to women and their families. 

Best regards, hope always,

Leonie & the AGCF Team.💜🚺🙆🏻‍♀️

Leonie Young MAICD, CEO AGCF

People and Purple Promos for Gynae Cancer include:

Kumagaya at Forrestville , WA.

Leonie at Grenfell and Condobolin, NSW.

Natasha at Brindabella Health Service, Queanbeyan, NSW.

Louise at Pelvic Hugs.

Christie @ Timboon DHS, Vic, hosting AGCF First chair & Ambassador, actor, author, Jean Kittson at a fun women's health dinner.

Cath M in Perth WA, hosting vulvar cancer awareness events. 🚺 

The Hall Ladies lunch club members wore a lot of purple - hats, beads, ribbons and nails - and raised $150 for AGCF at their favourite Pulp Books Cafe, Gold Creek, ACT, and Tassie sisters & Facebook friends chipped in to donate to AGCF too.

💜Overport hosted an amazing purple morning tea (see agcf Facebook and Insta).

Danielle, from Qld, wearing ovary socks, purple nails & ribbons, was interviewed by Ben Fordham, 2GB radio, Sydney, on her endometrial cancer journey and being a proud Ambassador for AGCF. 💜🙆🏻‍♀️