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Rachel Molly Markoff
Foundation

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Artist's Statement

 

The Rachel Molly Markoff Foundation was established in memory of Rachel, daughter of Eliane and Gary Markoff, twin sister to Audrey Markoff.


Rachel died of a brain tumor one week after her ninth birthday.


The Rachel Molly Markoff Foundation is a 501(c)(3) private foundation.


The tumor that took the life of Rachel Molly Markoff in 1992 was an inoperable brain stem glioma. Rachel’s life touched many people and there have been many tributes to Rachel from her friends and family and even those who never knew her but have been touched by her story.

To contribute, please make checks payable to:


The Rachel Molly Markoff Foundation
P.O. Box 81164
Wellesley, MA 02481
Phone: 781.235.6205

Art in Giving

 

The Rachel Molly Markoff Foundation

Helping families cope with childhood cancer

www.artingiving.org

 

 

 


About The Rachel Molly Markoff Foundation

The Rachel Molly Markoff Foundation uses 100 percent of the funds raised to support programs benefiting organizations focusing on supporting children and their families affected by pediatric cancer.


The Foundation’s administration is completely volunteer-supported, and there are no administrative or overhead costs.

In the past the Foundation has provided support to programs of the Children’s Hospital Boston including the following projects of the Center for Families, aimed at improving the hospital experience for patients and their families:

  • Pediatric Neurology and Neurosurgery Video: An educational overview of what children can expect during their stay created to reduce anxieties that children and their families often face in preparing for a visit to the hospital.
  • Keeping Connections Conference: The annual grief and bereavement conference, designed for families suffering the loss of a child, offers a compassionate forum for families and providers to communicate, support each other and understand each other’s needs.
  • Holistic Pediatric Health: A new meditation room has been outfitted—giving families space for personal reflection in a private, serene environment close to their medical unit. This meditation room provides inpatient consultations and treatment services in acupuncture, massage therapy, therapeutic touch, and Reiki.
  • Focus on Family Support Resource Fair: A annual fair, designed for families of children with special needs, helps ease the burden of service coordination and brings together hospital and community-based support service providers with parents and professionals.

A major tribute to Rachel’s memory is the Rachel Molly Markoff Chair of Research, created and funded in her name through the generous support of friends, family, companies and foundations.

Over the years the Foundation has supported the Brain Tumor Society in its grants to researchers dedicated to the science that provides hope for the eventual cure. These researchers are:

James K. Chen, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Molecular Pharmacology, Stanford University. Dr. Chen is studying the development of next-generation chemotherapies, specifically novel Hedgehog pathway antagonists, as potential medulloblastoma therapeutics. Conventional treatments of medulloblastomas in children are associated with high rates of recurrence, metastasis, and permanent disability. Selective pathway antagonists resulting from these studies will further future investigations of the Hedgehog pathway and the development of new therapies for this deadly cancer.


Adrienne C. Scheck, Ph.D. of Barrow Neurological Institute, Phoenix. Dr. Scheck’s lab recently found that tumors that recur following radiation and chemotherapy have cells with a specific genetic abnormality that is not found in the tumor cells prior to treatment. They hope to identify the role of this particular translocation in therapy resistance.


Michael C. Jensen, M.D., City of Hope National Medical Center. Dr. Jensen’s lab researched the genetic engineering of T-cells that might be deployed to target high grade glioma brain tumors.


Charles Eberhart, M.D. Ph.D., of Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Eberhart‘s laboratory was focused on understanding the molecular basis of medulloblastomas.


Myrna R. Rosenfeld, M.D., Ph.D., of Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research in New York. Dr. Rosenfeld’s research was on “Novel Approaches to Angiogenesis Inhibition in Experimental Glioma.”


Allen E. Bale, M.D., of Yale University School of Medicine. Dr. Bale’s research was on “The Hedgehog Pathway in Medullablastoma.”


Daniel W. Fults, M.D., of University of Utah School of Medicine. His project was “Somatic Cell Gene Transfer to Model Medulloblastoma in Mice.”

 


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