We are pleased to announce the recipients of the Māori Cancer Researcher Awards.
Grace Young
Read about Grace Young, one of the Award recipients.
Māori Cancer Researcher Awards 2022
PhD Scholarship
Supervisors: Dr. Sarah Baird, Dr. Nathan Kenny
University of Otago (Dunedin)
This project aims to develop a better treatment for triple negative breast cancer, which is fatal to many patients. This type of cancer is prevalent among young women in New Zealand, in particular, wahine Māori.
The best treatments for cancer are those that can specifically target cancer cells amongst healthy cells. So far, no such target exists for triple negative breast cancer, however we have identified a target that has promise, and developed a therapy that uses this target.
Over the course of this project, award recipient Grace Young will test how the targeted therapy affects cancer cells and whether it can destroy the cancer and therefore successfully treat the patient.
“Receiving this award is significant for both myself and my whānau as we experienced many hardships through to my early 20’s, including losing family and friends to breast cancer and my father to cancer. These losses pushed me to study towards cancer research in the hope of preventing the grief and trauma for other families that my whānau and I have experienced through losing loved ones to aggressive cancers with high recurrence rates.
Being chosen as a recipient of this award has filled my whānau with pride and has provided them with a sense of representation in a field that is under-represented by Māori. My whānau and I are extremely grateful for this opportunity to complete my PhD, with the hope of advancing treatments for young women diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer.”