Diane Langmack OAM, AGCF Board Chair.

Dear friends of AGCF, as we welcome the return of Spring, I invite you to join us this Spring as we go purple for gynae cancer, to have some purple fun with your friends, family or work mates while helping to raise funds and awareness of the 8 gynae cancers. Ideas include hosting a purple tie or scarf day, purple pet day, purple nail party, morning tea with purple cakes and hats, or an ovary or vulva sock day, your efforts will contribute to vital gynae cancer research.

I'm proud to be leading the Board to support the work of the AGCF, a small national, not for profit, gynae cancer research charity with a mighty cause. It was founded by Professor Neville Hacker AM MD, and launched in 2015, with the goals of raising funds for post-PhD researchers to conduct breakthrough laboratory research on the often deadly gynae cancers affecting women, and to raise awareness of the 8 gynae cancers: vulval, cervical, vaginal, ovarian, uterine, fallopian tube, peritoneal and placental. It won't surprise you to know that fund raising for gynae cancer research is proving challenging in these tough economic times and we are grateful for your support 💜.

We have an enviable health system in Australia, world leading in many areas, however, with rising gynae cancer rates of 7000 women newly diagnosed each year, and 2,200 deaths, (6 every day), now is a critical time for increasing life-saving laboratory research. Only cervical cancer has an effective vaccine AND a reliable screening test, the other 7 gynae cancers, including ovarian, vaginal and endometrial cancers, have no reliable early test.  Sadly, we are losing too many women from their families each year. Of the 7000 newly diagnosed each year, 30% will not survive beyond 5 years.

At AGCF, we raise funds for brilliant minds, like Dr Dane Cheasley of the Peter Mac Cancer Centre, Dr Liz Caldon of the Garvan Institute, Dr Dongli Lui of the Lowy Institute, and Dr Aime Powell, NotreDame Uni, to conduct vital breakthrough research, and we collaborate with other cancer support organisations to ensure that all women have access to the latest gynae cancer information, treatments and support, wherever they live in Australia. Read more here about why our research matters. 

Research saves lives, it saved mine. I'm only here today as a 3 times cancer survivor because of the research-leading, lifesaving cancer care that I received each time a new cancer developed. I am living my best life today as a wife, mother, grandmother, sister, friend, community partnership manager and voluntary AGCF board member, who has survived three different cancers. It hasn't been easy. I want to help AGCF researchers to aid prevention, find reliable tests and cures for the 8 gynae cancers. I hope my efforts and those of the AGCF brilliant mind researchers will save my young granddaughters and yours from gynae cancer, sharing hope💜.

I commend the AGCF to you for your support. Every donation over $2 is tax deductible, and every little bit helps. To see more information on AGCF, our Board Directors, CEO, and ambassadors, please visit the AGCF website.

Best wishes with going purple for gynae, please send your purple pics to info@agcf.org.au.

With grateful thanks, Diane 💜

Diane Langmack OAM, Board Chair, AGCF.

The AGCF team is beyond proud to congratulate our colleague Dr Margaret Heffernan OAM PhD on receiving one of the 2025 Cancer Australia Jeannie Ferris Awards for her outstanding efforts over 33 years to raise awareness of gynaecological cancers and generate national action across governments and politics; for harnessing bipartisan support for a Senate Inquiry into Gynae Cancers in 2006; and influencing the health and medical sectors to improve Australia's gynae cancer policies, practice, research and funding. 

Bipartisan investment in improving gynae cancer awareness, treatment outcomes and breakthrough research remains vitally important today, for the 7000 women newly diagnosed each year, and for those with advanced cancers, facing uncertain survival beyond 5 years.

The AGCF team congratulates the four recipients of the 2025 Jeannie Ferris Awards, Ms Lisa Briggs, Dr Margaret Heffernan OAM, Prof Gail Garvey AM, and Assoc Prof Mei Ling Yap, in recognition of their outstanding achievements in increasing equity of outcomes for people affected by cancer in Australia. 

Dr Margaret Heffernan OAM, PhD (Melb), says:

I am both honoured and humbled to receive the 2025 Cancer Australia Jeannie Ferris Award for my endeavours to achieve better outcome for those with a cancer diagnosis. I humbly accept the 2025 Jeannie Ferris Award on behalf of the invisible 'backroom' of heroes who have supported my vision for better outcomes, trekked with me unconditionally over the past 33 years. Jeannie's legacy is a reminder of the power of research, education, and advocacy in saving lives. Research saved my life…please do contribute what you can to research and enable others who are traversing a similar path to full recovery. We still have quite a journey ahead!

Left to right: Jeannie Ferris, Prof Neville Hacker and Dr Margaret Heffernan

Prof Neville Hacker AM MD, Founder & Director AGCF

Traditionally, epithelial ovarian cancers were believed to arise from the surface epithelium of the ovaries or from the epithelium of inclusion cysts. Tubal epithelial cancers were believed to arise from the lining epithelium of the tubes.

It is true that a number of ovarian cancers do arise from ovarian epithelial tissue, and these include low grade serous, endometrioid, clear cell and mucinous carcinomas. These are called Type 1 ovarian cancers. They generally have a better prognosis, and can sometimes arise from borderline ovarian tumours or from endometriosis.

Similarly, tubal cancers, particularly of the serous or endometrioid type, may occur as isolated cancers, and usually present with a watery vaginal discharge. Like primary peritoneal cancers, they are rare, representing less than 0.5% of all cancers of the female genital tract.

The most common and lethal form of ovarian cancer is high-grade serous carcinoma. In around 2007, two pathologists, Dr Christopher Crum from Harvard and Dr Robert Kurman from Johns Hopkins Universities independently determined that most of these cancers, together with many high-grade serous peritoneal cancers, arise from the fimbrial end of the fallopian tubes. This is particularly true for women who carry the BRCA 1 or BRCA2 mutations

They demonstrated that lesions called serous tubal intraepithelial carcinomas (STIC) first occur in the tubes, and ovarian and peritoneal high-grade serous cancers arise when these STIC lesions shed cells which implant and grow on the ovaries and/or peritoneum.

In 2014, the International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics (FIGO), changed their official staging system for tubal and ovarian cancers to one combined system that included cancers of the tubes, ovaries and peritoneum, to avoid the ongoing confusion associated with this new information.

Knowledge that most high-grade serous ovarian cancers actually start in the fallopian tubes has opened up possible options for both prevention and screening

The preventive option is to remove the fallopian tubes as a means of sterilisation, rather than simply placing a clip around them. The tubes can then be examined by a pathologist, and if  there are STIC lesions present, the ovaries should also be removed to prevent ovarian cancer. In women who have inherited one of the BRCA genes, it is standard practice to recommend that they have their children as early as possible, preferably in their 20s and early 30s, and then have their tubes and ovaries removed. It may now be possible to remove only the tubes in younger women. This will avoid the onset of premature menopause, which will happen if the ovaries are removed. The ovaries should then be removed when menopause has occurred.

A possible screening approach for tubal and ovarian cancer may be to use liquid Pap smears to try to identify serous cells that have been shed from the STIC lesions, and passed out through the cervix

Since the paradigm shift in thinking about ovarian cancer two decades ago, we have witnessed a lot of research trying to better characterise the premalignant tubal lesions, and trying to better utilise the information to benefit the patient. Much more research still needs to be done, but a complete summary of this research so far can be found in the attached paper.

Prof Neville Hacker AM MD, Founder & Director, AGCF.

David Starr writes about his family's experience adapting to Sapoo's gynae cancer diagnosis.

Sunday afternoon April 6th, 2025, another regular weekend with the twins Izzy & Lilly, who along with their Daddy, enthusiastically turn up at Nanna's house for a sneaky afternoon of watching their beloved Bulldogs playing rugby league over a couple of pizzas.

Spirits are high, our Bulldogs are well up against the Knights in what promises to be yet another win and the usual banter is in full swing. Text messages are flying, and I am checking the nearest rivals in the work footy tipping competition in preparation for Monday morning bragging rights.

Midway through the second half, and with our bellies full.  I would ironically receive a text message from my wife stating, "my bloods are fine, all good". This was a report from the Mater emergency department in Brisbane.

Ironically, for the week prior, my beautiful wife had been complaining of some bloating, but an increasingly swollen belly for an otherwise healthy, active and passionate make-up artist living her best life was of minor concern and certainly was not raising alarm bells.

In fact, we would banter with each other about needing a "good clean out" and that I, her husband, was significantly more full of BS than anyone we knew.

However, after seeing a GP the previous week and failing to respond to the laxatives that were recommended, we sensed something else was at play. 

Sapoo went to the Emergency Department at the Mater Hospital while I watched the footy and a doctor ordered a CT scan of the abdomen. Something inside me told me to go and be with my wife after the footy finished. What was to follow altered our lives forever.

I arrived at the Emergency Department and was greeted by the nurse, who said: "She is in that room, I'll let her tell you".  Upon entering the room, our world stood still.

The blank look on my darling wife's face is something I will take to my final days.

Knowing her genetic predisposition (BRCA1), we had subconsciously feared this day but were somewhat naïvely comforted by a clear scan only 2 years earlier.

That's the thing with ovarian cancer; there are no pre-emptive scans of the precision or accuracy required…….there are no warning signs……there are no obvious triggers.

Thanks to the work of legions of underpaid researchers, advances in early diagnosis for gynaecological cancers are slowly progressing but almost always in the shadows of advances in the more publicly recognised breast, brain & skin cancers, whose campaigns are almost impossible to miss.

We are a regular family who, within the space of two football seasons, have seen the queen of our castle, the matriarch of our family, the beat of our collective hearts, go from a healthy, happy mother and wife to someone bravely fighting ovarian cancer.

Gynaecological cancer matters - it's not someone else's aunty, someone else's sister, it's now my wife.

It is ripping at the hearts of countless unassuming families without as much as a whisper of its intent. It's a time for change, to turn the whisper into a howling wind that cannot be ignored.

This is my story, the story of a regular working-class family man in the southern suburbs of Brisbane, which we hope will further increase the awareness of gynaecological cancers and inspire the efforts of many behind the scenes researchers in this field.

David Starr,

Husband of the bravest woman on the planet.

The family celebrated an early Mother's Day for Sapoo.

For years, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women in remote Kimberley communities faced an impossible choice—travel hundreds of kilometres for cervical screening or go without. This is why rates of cervical cancer are much higher in indigenous women. Now, groundbreaking research has completely transformed that choice.

The PREVENT Project, on which I was the lead researcher, recently published our results in The Lancet Public Health. We were able to demonstrate that taking cervical screening directly to women's communities can reshape healthcare access. Instead of women travelling to healthcare, healthcare now travels to them. Working with six Kimberley communities, we co-designed, with Aboriginal leaders, a culturally respectful approach combining self-collection, immediate HPV testing, and same-day specialist follow-up. Women could receive test results within one hour and access specialist care without having to leave their community.

Almost 110 women participated, reaching 64% of the region's annual screening target in just four months. Nearly all participants (99%) said they would recommend the program to others, citing privacy, convenience, and the relief of same-day results. As one participant shared: "I was very happy to have all tests and procedures done in one day. I would have been anxious if I had to wait. It's about time remote communities had proper access to healthcare."

Dr Aime Powell PhD,

AGCF Fellow and Lead Researcher PREVENT Project

Read the full Lancet article here.

I am pleased to provide an update to the AGCF of my team's progress in the lab supported by the generous funding of the AGCF and Carmen Duncan Fellowship.

PARP inhibitors are an important recent advance for women with high-grade serous ovarian cancer who carry a BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutation. These oral medicines can help prevent any remaining cancer cells from growing after surgery and chemotherapy, and many women benefit from taking them as part of their treatment. However, our research addresses a serious and common problem: while PARP inhibitors often extend survival for women with these genetic changes, unfortunately, most cancers will eventually stop responding to these drugs. When this happens, there are currently few other effective treatment options available, and the risk of cancer progression increases.

Our project is focused on finding new ways to help women whose cancers have become resistant to PARP inhibitors. In our laboratory, we have developed models of cancer cells that no longer respond to these drugs. Notably, we have observed that this resistance seems to be a permanent change — the cancer cells remain resistant to the drugs even after the drugs have been removed for some time. Our experiments have also shown that these resistant cells have changes in how they process nutrients, especially sugars, to fuel their growth.

Moving forward, we are closely investigating exactly how these resistant cells process and use metabolites compared to cells that remain sensitive to PARP inhibitors. We are also looking at samples from patients to see if these same metabolic changes are present in real cancers. By better understanding these changes, our goal is to identify new treatment strategies that could one day help women with ovarian cancer for whom PARP inhibitors are no longer effective.

A/Prof Liz Caldon, PhD, AGCF Research Fellow

Conjoint Assoc Professor, Garvan Institute of Medical Research, UNSW

Newsletter wrap up, including intro by AGCF Board Chair Diane Langmack OAM, David Starr's poignant letter, New RCA Gynae Cancer Education Hub, Research updates, and thank you to donors from the AGCF team.

You may have read in the Newsletter David Starr's beautiful letter about the shock of his wife's unexpected diagnosis of ovarian cancer near mother's day this year and the impact it had on Sapoo, David and his family, including young daughters, and their shared hope for Sapoo's recovery after treatment.  David's moving letter illustrates that a gynae cancer diagnosis doesn't just affect the person, it affects families, carers, husbands, and children.  We extend our very best wishes to Sapoo for her recovery, and to David and family as they navigate through the months of hospital and home cancer care and treatment.

The impact of a sudden gynae cancer diagnosis is why AGCF is committed to funding research for a brighter future, sharing hope.  It's why our Board Chair, Diane Langmack OAM, gives so freely of her time.  As a 3 times cancer survivor, Diane's remarkable journey has been one of resilience and trust in research evidence, while taking steps to maintain her overall health and wellbeing. Diane shares that her early responses to cancer markers and a reliance on her oncology team's recommended care and treatments have aided her recovery from 3 different cancers, helped build her resilience, and zest for living her best life as a wife, mother, grandmother, sister, friend, AGCF Chair, and General Manager of Stakeholder Engagement, Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs Rugby League Club. 

A new gynae cancer awareness and education hub - AGCF partner Rare Cancers Australia – RCA will be launching 26 September

As valued partners in improving gynae cancer awareness and cancer care, AGCF is supporting a new educational initiative developed by Rare Cancers Australia, as part of the Australian Cancer Nursing and Navigation Program.  

On Friday, 26 September, RCA are launching the Education Hub, a free online platform offering practical, evidence-based learning modules for healthcare professionals and carers supporting people with rare and less common cancers, including several gynae cancers.

The first module, is focused on gynaecological cancers, most of which are classed as rare or less common, and includes a four-part video series and downloadable resources covering: 

       - Latest evidence on diagnosis, treatment, and care 

       - Emerging technologies and research 

       - Key challenges and disparities in care 

       - Importance of multidisciplinary, patient-centred support 

Participants will gain insights into the burden of gynaecological cancers in Australia and learn how to deliver more equitable, compassionate care. Facilitated presentations to groups are also available through online bookings. 

Future modules currently under development will cover thoracic, male reproductive, sarcoma, and lower digestive rare and less common cancers. For more information, please visit the Education Hub - Rare Cancers Australia.

Thank you from the AGCF team to the following people and agencies for their generous donations, every donation helps, no matter the size.  To the marvellous Ford Rangerettes Official; The Behreen Foundation; The QLD Gentlemen who lunch with Nev; The Daughters of Penelope and families for their movie night at the Como (Vic); Jeremy 'Harry' Harris, entertainer, singer, musician, who put his fragile body on the line in the Perth WA HBF run for a reason, running for his wife, Elle, in her battle with peritoneal cancer; Richard & Jess Callendar & guests at the Greatest Lunch of the Year (Sydney); to the Hall Ladies Lunch Club (ACT) and the Sydney Sock Project for their ongoing support to AGCF from ovary & vulva sock sales; and to the many others who supported the AGCF and our efforts these last few months, and previously.

New donors include: Ford Rangerettes Official with over 4200 female Ford Ranger and Everest owners in their national club, with members based all over Australia.

It has been running since 2018 and over that time they have become more than just a Ford 4WD Club.  Unfortunately, many of the members have been affected by, or know someone, who has been affected by gynae cancers. According to Jane Cartwright, when the members saw the lack of support, awareness, education and funding that gynaecological cancers receive, compared to other types of cancers, it was an easy fundraising decision for them to support the AGCF.

Over 50 Rangerettes across Australia participated in their first National UTE-R-US Rally by sending in photos from their local events.  Members paid $5 per photo category to win some really cool prizes from their generous sponsors.  In total, over $1000 was raised and donated to the AGCF.  See the pics on www.fordrangerettesofficial.com on Facebook and Instagram at Ford Rangerettes Official, or on LinkedIn at AGCF.

The Greatest Lunch of the Year, an annual event, was held in August in the Winx Grandstand, Royal Randwick Racecourse, Sydney, ably hosted by Richard Callender and attended by legends of the sporting world who came together to fight brain cancer with the Mark Hughes Foundation & to support lab research into all 8 gynae cancers with the Australian Gynae Cancer Foundation.

In attendance were Rugby League greats, Wayne Bennett, Cameron Smith & Ricky Stuart, who led the rugby lineup, with racing fans and punters hearing the latest spring updates from Annabel Neasham, Chris Waller, John O'Shea, Bjorn Baker & Adrian Bott! Due to popular demand, Joey Johns was back in action alongside Richie for Rugby League talk, along with racing royalty Kenny Callander who shared his pick of the yard. The AGCF team was delighted for AGCF to be included as a charity participant and we extend our thanks to Richard, Jess and all the attendees for their support.

As we move into the Spring season, with the promise of new beginnings, we welcome the opportunities that collaborating with many gynae cancer care agencies like RCA and ANZGOG provides, in order to grow Australia's breakthrough gynae cancer research knowledge and boost the pool of brilliant minds researchers like AGCF Fellows, Dr Liz Caldon, Dr Aime Powell and Dr Dane Cheasley. Their life saving, life extending collaborative research efforts in PARPi, gene therapy; Indigenous and remote cancer diagnosis and support; and new treatments for non-serous ovarian cancers are receiving international recognition, sharing gynae cancer knowledge, sharing hope. 

Best regards everyone, thank you for your ongoing support to the AGCF team,

Leonie Young MAICD
CEO & Dep Chair AGCF.