Cord Blood -   once a waste product -   now the ...
  Medicine of the Future

Two further Cord Blood Research Grant cheques presented in 2008

Associate Professor Simon Barry opening the red envelope containing the grant cheque, watched by 2007/2008 IWA President, Liz Ralston

In March 2008, Associate Professor Simon Barry was handed a cheque for $61 094 in front of a group of Inner Wheel members and his Research Team at the Child Health Research Institute, Women’s and Children’s Hospital, North Adelaide.   This grant will be used by the research team to to develop the clinical application of cord blood stem cells which, when cultured to increase their numbers and change them to specialised white blood cells, may be capable of preventing auto immune diseases such as type 1 diabetes, or facilitating transplants without chemical immunosuppression.

IWA President 2007/2008, Liz Ralston, Dr Faten Zaibak and IWA National Project Coordinator, Anne McGill

Three weeks later, in April, Dr Faten Zaibak was presented with a grant cheque for $59 089, which will be used by Faten, Professor Robert Williamson and their research team from the Department of Pathology, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria to support research seeking to extend the use of cord blood to treat genetic diseases, specifically investigating if cord blood-derived stem cells can be used to treat cystic fibrosis. The April presentation was in front of Victorian members and held in an amazing museum displaying organs and bones, some having been on show for nearly a century!

Following the grant to Faten and her team, the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry & Health Sciences, Melbourne, Professor James A Angus has recognised Inner Wheel as a Patron, in the ‘Visionary’ Category.

The amounts sought in their Applications for a Grant intrigued Inner Wheel Australia President 2007/8, Liz Ralston, who asked both teams how they arrived at such a precise figure. Both grants will be used to pay the salaries of exciting, new, talented members of their Research Teams.   Without our funding for these brilliant minds, research would not be able to continue at a satisfactory pace.   Research teams in any field are not supported by Government until their project is confirmed as being achievable -   therefore Inner Wheel's wonderful Cord Blood Research Fund grants are helping these technicians find the way forward ...

Cord Blood -   once a waste product -   now the ...  
Medicine of the Future

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