Leukemia Focus FAQs

The landscape of blood cancer-focused nonprofits has evolved significantly over the years, making it necessary for us to evaluate our overall effect on blood cancers and determine if there's an opportunity to have an even greater impact.

Several large nonprofits currently invest in research and support patients with a single type of blood cancer. The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society – one of the largest nonprofits in the United States – encompasses all blood cancers.
 

 
Although leukemia is the second most prevalent blood cancer in the US, there are no large national research organizations that exclusively focus on it. This represents an opportunity for the Leukemia Research Foundation to have a greater impact on leukemia.

By focusing on leukemia only, we will no longer be duplicating the efforts of our colleague foundations. All of our resources will be allocated to impacting one disease and its subtypes – instead of spread out over multiple – allowing us to accelerate significant advances in leukemia research and support more patients with the disease.

Focusing on leukemia is a decision the Leukemia Research Foundation Board of Directors and staff have been considering for the past several years. To make this decision, we conducted extensive market research, analyzed our constituent database, consulted our Medical Advisory Board, and engaged long-time donors, loyal supporters, patients, caregivers, and partner organizations.

Because of our name, the large majority of who we serve and who support us have a connection to leukemia. Many (80%) of individual donors reference a direct connection to leukemia as a reason for their support, and all volunteer chapters were initially formed to honor someone battling leukemia. Patients and caregivers who attend our education programs expressed that topics are too broad. Focusing on a specific disease subtype (e.g., acute myeloid leukemia, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, etc.) would be more beneficial. Every audience we engaged emphasized confusion with our mismatched name (Leukemia Research Foundation) and mission (conquer all blood cancers).

The research proposals we receive from around the world and the projects we fund each year are primarily leukemia-focused. Sentiments from researchers continue to show a need for leukemia funding, especially for acute myeloid leukemia, which has the lowest survival rate of all blood cancers.

Not at all. The Foundation has and continues to exhibit solid financial growth. Despite the pandemic, in 2021, we funded the largest number of research projects in our history, expanded our patient and family support programs to every state and several countries, and earned Charity Navigator's 4-star rating.

We're at a dynamic point in our organization's continued development where focusing on leukemia offers an opportunity to fuel growth, both in revenue and impact.

The Leukemia Research Foundation would not exist without our community of supporters, patients, caregivers, researchers, and healthcare professionals – they are at the heart of what we do and fundamental to our mission. Focusing on leukemia will allow us to better serve our existing and future audiences in the following ways.

• Greater impact on research. All research funding will be directed toward projects that advance treatments and cures for leukemia and a precursor of it, myelodysplastic syndromes.
• Focused communications and programs. Because we are not spreading resources out over multiple diseases, we can focus our efforts on developing more leukemia-focused content, communications, and programs to better benefit patients and caregivers.
• More directed funding. All resources will be allocated to leukemia research and supporting leukemia patients and their families. The individuals, groups, foundations, and corporations who have a direct interest in leukemia can be confident their support will impact leukemia.
• Eliminates confusion. With our focus on leukemia, the Foundation's name and mission are aligned, eliminating confusion about what we do and who we serve.

Research grants for the 2022 funding cycle were awarded in June 2022 to projects focused on various blood cancers.

For the 2023 funding cycle, we are only accepting projects that directly impact leukemia.

While leukemia survival rates have increased over the past 75 years, much work still needs to be done. By allocating all of our research funding to leukemia, we will have a greater impact on advancing treatments and developing cures.

As of July 15, 2022, our patient and family support programs will be focused exclusively on leukemia. This includes our education programs, peer support services, Patient Grant Program, and the diseases and informational content and resource directory on our website.

We've connected with our colleague blood cancer foundations to ensure all support services we were providing to non-leukemia patients and caregivers can be fulfilled. A list of these organizations and the support services they provide are included below.

• Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (leukemia, lymphoma, myeloma, myelodysplastic syndromes, myeloproliferative neoplasms): Offers financial assistance, support groups, online chats, education programs, and more.
• Lymphoma Research Foundation (lymphoma): Offers a patient helpline, financial assistance, peer support, education programs, and more.
• Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation (multiple myeloma): Offers financial assistance, support groups, education programs, and more.
• International Myeloma Foundation (multiple myeloma): Offers a patient helpline, financial assistance, support groups, education programs, and more.
• MDS Foundation (myelodysplastic syndromes): Offers informational content, resources, peer support, education programs, and more.
• MPN Research Foundation (myeloproliferative neoplasms): Offers disease and informational content, peer support, a directory of support groups, and more.

Patients and caregivers: To provide only relevant information to our patient and caregiver database, we will no longer be sending email or mail communications to those who have noted their diagnosis as lymphoma, myeloma, myelodysplastic syndromes, or myeloproliferative neoplasms. If you have one of these diagnoses and want to continue receiving our communications, we'd love to include you! Simply subscribe to our outreach here.

All other contacts (donors, supporters, volunteers, researchers, healthcare professionals, etc.): If you are not a patient or caregiver and have received email communications from us previously, you are still on our email list. We'd love to continue communicating with you, but understand if you don't have a connection to leukemia and no longer want to hear from us. If this is the case, click here to unsubscribe from future email outreach. If you'd like to be removed from our contact database entirely, please email kelsey@leukemiarf.org.

If you don't receive emails from us but would like to, click here to subscribe to our email list.

This past year, we refreshed our website, social media channels, and other communications to better serve our audiences and better reflect who we are as an organization.

The Foundation's new logo signifies interconnectedness and continuity to convey that as we evolve, our pursuit for a cure remains the same. The lines in the icon represent how our different communities – supporters, patients, caregivers, researchers, healthcare professionals, and partners – come together to achieve the Foundation's vision of a world without leukemia.

The lettering in the logo was changed from all caps to title case to give a softer and more welcoming feel. The font used has rounder edges to align with this softer feel and is more modern to show our focus on progress and innovation. "Leukemia" and "Research" are more pronounced in black, emphasizing our organization's focus.

Our focus on funding research to find better treatments and cures for leukemia and supporting patients and families remains unchanged. We've updated our vision, mission, website URL, and email domain to align with our focus on leukemia.

• Vision: A world without leukemia.
• Mission: Our mission is to cure leukemia by funding innovative research, and to support patients and families.
• Website URL: Changed from allbloodcancers.org to leukemiarf.org.
• Email domain: Updated to match our new URL (@leukemiarf.org). Be sure to add info@leukemiarf.org to your email address book. Click here for staff's new email addresses.

We are very excited about the Leukemia Research Foundation's future and impact on advancing science and curing leukemia.

We recently finalized our three-year strategic plan, which focuses on four core strategies:

1. Advancing science
2. Cultivating strategic leadership
3. Expanding our reach
4. Enhancing value

Click here to view our 2022-2025 Strategic Plan.