Children’s Wisconsin has awarded State Senator Mary Felzkowsi (R-Tomahawk) and State Representative Robert Wittke (R-Racine) with the tenth annual Children’s Champion Policy Awards.
As a parent, chances are you’ve seen it or have even worn it on your shirt: spit-up.
For 30 years, I have been helping children who have cancer. Every child and every family has a different story, but each one is a story of hope and courage. And each one begins the same way — with the words no parents ever want to hear … “your child has cancer.” They’re scared and they feel powerless. That is the reality for families we meet every day.
Over the past 30 years we’ve made remarkable strides in treating kids with cancer, now with successful outcomes for 80 percent of the kids we see. But that means 20 percent of cancers are still very difficult to treat. And our treatments are still associated with a tremendous amount of acute and long-term side effects, even for the children who do successfully beat the cancer. With 13,400 children diagnosed with cancer each year, that’s just unacceptable!
It’s research that has brought us to an 80 percent success rate, and research that will bring us the rest of the way to treating the most difficult cancers. This is not insurmountable!
We are recognizing remarkable possibilities, for example, as we further study genetics. As we understand how an individual child’s genetic makeup affects how he or she responds to specific therapies, we can better target medications to effectively treat the disease without destroying healthy cells.
This need for further research is why corporate and individual philanthropic support is so vital to our work with kids every day. Here at Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin, the vast majority of the children we treat are enrolled in at least one clinical trial. We are taking what we learn in the lab and applying it to our care and, likewise, taking what we learn from our patients to inform our research.
As federal research dollars continue to decrease, it’s other funding sources that make our work possible. We are incredibly grateful for partners such as the MACC Fund and Northwestern Mutual, as well as the gifts and fundraising efforts of so many more who have made such a tremendous impact on our program.
September is National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. On behalf of all the families we serve, I am thankful for the vital support we receive and am hopeful we can continue to spread the word, providing greater hope for cures as well as improved quality of life for our patients and their families.
Children’s Wisconsin has awarded State Senator Mary Felzkowsi (R-Tomahawk) and State Representative Robert Wittke (R-Racine) with the tenth annual Children’s Champion Policy Awards.
Mental health walk-in care is now available at the Children’s Wisconsin Kenosha Clinic thanks to a $3 million gift from Kohl’s.
Milwaukee is now home to one of the nation’s first institutes designed specifically to focus on the neurological needs of people from birth to old age.
Outstanding and inspiring stories were featured on our social media channels this year. Here are our top 10 stories of 2023.
The year 2023 at Children’s Wisconsin has been defined by transformation and the top news stories of the year reflect that.
As the director of Clinical Engineering at Children’s Wisconsin, Ann leads a team who supports the management of medical equipment throughout the system.
While great strides have been made the last few years, our work is not done until we have greatly reduced the number of kids who become hooked after vaping.