Professor Matt Dun
University of Newcastle/Hunter Medical Research Institute
Medallist’s personal connection changes trajectory of childhood brain cancer
Professor Matt Dun, whose work is focused on improving the survival of patients diagnosed with the world’s deadliest and most aggressive form of paediatric cancer, is the Australian Society for Medical Research (ASMR) Medallist for 2024.
In 2018, Professor Dun’s research took a deeply personal turn when his two-year-old daughter Josephine was diagnosed with Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma (DIPG) – an incurable childhood brain cancer.
Professor Dun, a paediatric leukaemia research specialist at the University of Newcastle and Hunter Medical Research Institute, extended his research to DIPG after discovering that palliative radiation was the only therapy available for patients who, on average, survive between nine and 11 months after diagnosis.
Through genetic sequencing of Josephine’s tumour and an extensive literature review, Professor Dun and his team identified a gene critical to the development of DIPG, and a combination of drugs to target it.
Josephine was the first child in the world given the new therapies that slowed the tumour’s growth and gave her another year of life. She passed away in December 2019, 22 months after her diagnosis.
Professor Dun’s research showed for the first time that the trajectory of DIPG could be changed. “The therapies stabilised the disease and Josie learnt to walk again, swim and have her one and only dance concert. And we had a great Christmas with her cousins and our family,” Professor Dun says.
Professor Dun leads a team of more than 20 researchers who are analysing DIPG tumours to identify disease subtypes and further refine treatments. Phase 2adaptive clinical trials testing the new therapies are underway involving 150 patients and 32 hospitals around the world. Professor Dun is also looking at targetted immune therapies to further extend patient survival.
He says research funding has been critical in advancing DIPG therapies and outcomes for young patients.
In 2019, inspired by the impact of jogging on alleviating the emotional toll of Josephine’s illness, he established with family members the charity RUN DIPG. With the motto of ‘moving towards a cure’ it has raised $5.6 million, funding specialist equipment and medical staff, and is supporting families, clinical trials andother DIPG research.
Professor Dun says there is a “great opportunity” for governments to partner with philanthropists to boost investment in medical research and target funding to areas of need. “Every dollar that is raised by philanthropy should be matched by the government,” he says.
As the 2024 ASMR Medallist Professor Dun will give a National Press Club address on 22 October. “It’s a huge honour to be named the ASMR Medallist in 2024 and extremely humbling,” he says. “And it comes with a really good opportunity to advocate for health and medical research and for families that have faced this terrible monster and those that will tragically face it in the future.”