What is the science behind this project?

Professor Saha is investigating the most common type of childhood cancer, acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL), which accounts for one in four of all cancers in children in the UK. His ultimate goals are to find ways to predict which children will not respond to current treatments and to develop potential new drugs to give them instead.

His team are carrying out sophisticated experiments on samples from children with ALL. They are aiming to pinpoint key molecular differences between those who are successfully treated and those whose treatment fails. Professor Saha hopes this will lead to new tests that can predict early on whether a treatment will be effective - so doctors can choose a different one if necessary.

The researchers are also looking at whether they can block certain molecules involved in drug resistance as a new way to treat these children in the future.

The people behind the science

Cancer Research UK has funded Professor Saha's ground-breaking research for the past 16 years. He is passionate about finding new ways to improve the outlook for those children who don’t respond to current treatments. Under his expert guidance, the team have all the necessary skills and experience to help fight childhood leukaemia. And as Professor Saha is also a cancer doctor who treats children with the disease, he is ideally placed to take his lab findings into the clinic as quickly as possible.

We are committed to improving survival for every child with cancer. Professor Saha’s work offers hope to those children with ALL who cannot currently be treated successfully.

For more information about children's cancer you can visit our CancerHelp UK website children's cancer pages.

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Anne's Dad's Diary

This is my account of life with Anne before and after she had been diagnosed with leukaemia.

Before being diagnosed

We went to Normandy, France in late September 2003 for a family holiday. Anne was completely fine and had loads of energy. By December, Anne had changed a lot. She was pale and lacked enthusiasm for practically everything.

Just after Christmas Anne got a painful spot on her back. Suiyee took her to the doctors and got some ointment. Anne also had a couple of big dark bruises on her legs. I thought she had banged her legs but unexplained bruises are a common symptom of leukaemia so I think I was mistaken.

Hearing the word Cancer

When a second spot appeared on her lower back Suiyee took Anne to see the doctor again. Anne was in pain and fell quite ill. Then she had a really high temperature on the Saturday and Sunday night. We didn’t get any sleep as Anne was crying. On the Monday we were sent to the hospital where Anne had many tests.

Finally at 3 am, Suiyee and I were taken into the parent’s kitchen by the doctors. I can’t remember much but the gist was that Anne might have cancer and she needed to be transferred.

All I could think of was that Anne (probably) had cancer. Knowing very little about cancer I thought it meant Anne would die soon. I was absolutely exhausted and numb. I drove home in tears.

Arriving at Royal London

When we arrived there were some children around that didn’t have any hair. I found this quite shocking and disturbing.

We were told more about leukaemia and how successful they were in treating it. It looked likely that Anne had it, tests were being done and we’d know later that day. I kept hoping and praying the results would come back negative. I spent most of the day crying when no-one was looking.

To say everything was overwhelming is a complete understatement!

We had a long talk with the consultant about Anne’s treatment. Everything seemed well in hand and they had already worked out a plan for Anne’s treatment over the next two years. I was now thinking of how we would all get through every day rather than thinking that Anne had cancer and she was going to die.

Three and a half weeks in hospital

Most of the time in hospital was a bit of a blur. Anne didn’t have any energy and just wanted to watch TV. For the first couple of weeks Anne was on a drip all the time. The only time we left her alone was when she was asleep and one of us popped out to get something to eat. Work was very supportive.

Anne was amazing, despite her being really ill. She was so brave, co-operative and a real inspiration to us.

When we finally left Royal London it was a bit scary. We had lots of papers and notes. It was quite shocking to read that some children still died from leukaemia. It was worrying being on our own, but it was lovely to get Anne back home.

Care at home

When Anne first came home she was regularly vomiting. Anne hated being sick and would cry loudly. This was distressing to watch as Anne didn’t understand why this was happening.

When Anne was going through a bad patch she wasn’t interested in anything at all. All she wanted to do was eat or sleep or watch TV. The Sound of Music became a big part of life in our house. Anne had watched it practically every day whilst at Royal London. All of us now know most of the words.

Anne started to lose her hair about a month after hospital. There was hair absolutely everywhere. Suiyee cut it really short one night and Anne wore a scarf all the time and she quite enjoyed it. Anne really missed her hair, and would make pretend hair with tea towels.

The quantity of medicine Anne had to take was quite shocking. For one short period of time she was taking five different sorts of medicine a day. A particular low point for me was when I gave Anne the wrong medicine. I had to take Anne in for a blood test and she had to have even more medicine to counter the effects. I felt very very guilty about this. I overheard the doctor say on the phone “I have got Anne Ranasinghe’s father here and he has just overdosed his daughter…”. I remember going to Sainsbury’s and not being able to stop myself crying.

When Anne was first diagnosed and we were told the treatment would go on for just over two years, it seemed impossible to imagine the end. It was a case of just plodding and struggling on and counting down the weeks. It did get a lot better and much easier and we managed to get into an almost normal routine fairly soon. We were very lucky with Anne’s treatment and most of it went to plan, we hardly had any complications or unplanned hospital stays.

Update - December 2009

Last day of treatment

Anne’s last day of treatment was 31st March 2006. We had been looking forward to this day for a long, long time. This day was even more special as it was the day before my birthday. When we were at GOSH for our final treatment there was some confusion about whether it was that day or the following Friday! We weren’t having any of it and made it clear in no uncertain terms that today was the last day of treatment. To celebrate we were leaving the following morning for a weekend in Bruges – this involved a lot of chocolates for all of us.

Anne didn’t really understand what the end of treatment meant, and as the staff at GOSH were so nice, she didn’t mind coming to the clinic. This was a real testament to how fantastic all the staff were at Elephant Day Care. We thought that we would really appreciate that we didn’t have to give Anne medicine everyday; however, surprisingly quickly it was life back to usual and giving medicine everyday was almost forgotten.

Life after treatment

We had another trip away to celebrate two years off treatment—this was Lille. I thought we would celebrate the anniversary of the end of Anne’s treatment for many years, but just one year later the date passed and none of us noticed.

Life is really back to normal for all of us. Anne goes to her local hospital just 3 times a year. There are only two things to be careful of: getting sunburnt (skin cancer) and smoking. Anne is only 9 so we aren’t too worried about her smoking just yet! Anne plays the violin, can read and write Chinese, is a good swimmer, and loves riding her bike when the weather is better.

We were so lucky with her treatment; we hardly had any complications and sailed through the treatment (although it didn’t feel like that at the time). I now do some charity work that involves writing documentation for parents of children with cancer. It is nice to be able to put something back. Earlier this year Anne was also in a TV advert for Cancer Research UK. This was a great experience for us. Seeing Anne on TV and in posters in Cancer Research UK shops was quite something. And much more importantly we were informed the summer campaign was really successful in raising money for Cancer Research UK.

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