The "la Caixa" Banking Foundation and CIMA join forces against liver cancer
This new project is the result of partnership agreement between both institutions, to which the "la Caixa" Banking Foundation allocates 2,850,000 euros over three years.
Jaume Giró, director general of the "la Caixa" Banking Foundation, and Mª Pilar Civeira, director of research center Applied Medicine (CIMA) of the University of Navarra, accompanied by professors Matias Ávila and Juan José Lasarte, principal investigators of project, today presented an ambitious study to find solutions to liver diseases in which new prevention strategies and ways to treat liver cancer will be sought.
The vital function of the liver is threatened in situations such as chronic viral infections, excessive alcohol consumption, or nutritional disorders associated with obesity. The progression of liver disease results in the death of hepatocytes, the induction of inflammation (hepatitis), the accumulation of scar tissue (fibrosis) and the appearance of regeneration nodules (cirrhosis) that favor the development of liver cancer. This evolution is accompanied by a significant loss of liver function, which means that in many cases the only therapeutic alternative is liver transplantation.
In the European Union, nearly 29 million people suffer from chronic liver disease, and there are 170,000 deaths per year as a result of cirrhosis, in addition to 47,000 deaths due to liver cancer. In order to reverse this status, the "la Caixa" Banking Foundation and CIMA are launching this project of research, to which the financial institution allocates 2,850,000 euros over three years.
"By promoting the programs of research, the "la Caixa" Banking Foundation contributes to expanding the frontiers of knowledge , directing its intervention towards the search for solutions to the great challenges facing humanity, many of them related to health, and thus improving the lives of millions of people. This is one of the entity's strategic lines of action," said Jaume Giró, former student of the University (Journalism '87).
The new project will provide insight into the molecular mechanisms involved in liver cancer development , in order to find targets that will improve the diagnosis and monitoring of these diseases. This will also lead to new avenues of prevention and treatment that could change the course of these devastating diseases. To this end, they will focus on:
- New avenues for the treatment of cirrhosis, with the goal to restore liver function, reduce the need for transplantation and prevent liver cancer development .
- Immunotherapy strategies, focusing on therapeutic vaccination and adoptive cell therapy against liver cancer.
- development of new methods to attack cancer cells by inhibiting altered tumor genes.
According to Drs. Matías Ávila and Juan José Lasarte, "the value of this new research lies in the approach multidisciplinary, where the mechanisms involved in liver cancer will be studied in depth in order to identify new therapeutic targets and develop innovative strategies to prevent and cure hepatocarcinoma development ".
Sergio Roa and Sarai Sarvide explain to Jaume Giró, director general of the Fundación Bancaria la Caixa, their work in the Hemato-oncology Program at CIMA. PHOTO: Jesús Garzaron
For more than 30 years, the "la Caixa" Banking Foundation has been supporting the research of excellence. In these three decades, the entity has allocated more than 380 million euros to support research through 352 projects; it has awarded 4,544 excellence scholarships for promote the training of young people in a hundred Spanish universities and centers, and has promoted 1,629 clinical trials of new treatments for patients with cancer, AIDS or malaria, among other diseases. In addition, in 2016 it has helped to hire more than 650 researchers, thus contributing to the incorporation of new staff in research centers.
The new call for biomedical research projects in Spain and Portugal that was launched at the end of 2017 once again ratifies the commitment of the "la Caixa" Banking Foundation to research and internationalization. The goal of the initiative is to promote projects of excellence in the fight against the diseases with the greatest impact in the world, such as cardiovascular, neurological, infectious and oncological diseases.
The 2016-2019 Strategic Plan intensifies this support by tripling the budget dedicated to the research to reach 90 million euros in 2019. An effort that makes the Foundation the second in Europe and the third in the world in terms of philanthropy.
The "la Caixa" Banking Foundation's commitment to the welfare of people translates into an increase in its budget to 510 million euros in 2017, compared to 500 million euros in the previous nine years. Globally, in 2016 it promoted nearly 50,000 initiatives, from which more than 10.5 million people benefited.
In the Comunidad Foral, "la Caixa" Welfare Projects allocated 64 million euros in the period between 2012 and 2017, the current fiscal year in which the annual budget of 13.5 million euros already appropriated in 2016 has been maintained.
In addition, "la Caixa" Welfare Projects has also committed in Navarra to give a solid and lasting boost to the main poles of research. Thus, at partnership with Fundación Caja Navarra, it has committed an investment of 6.4 million euros for the period 2017-2020, distributed among the following institutions: University of Navarra (€1.6 million), Public University of Navarra (€1.6 million), CIMA (€1.2 million), Navarrabiomed (€1.2 million), Clínica Universidad de Navarra (€400,000), UNED Pamplona (€280,000) and UNED Tudela (€120,000).