Dr. Aru Narendran

Dr. Aru Narendran has some fighting words for cancer. He calls cancer weak and fragile, winning only because it knows how to beat the system, and he is single-minded in his determination to prevent cancer from winning.

“There is absolutely no reason we can’t eradicate kids’ cancer in our lifetime,” he says.

It may seem like a tall order, but a few minutes with Narendran and his research and you’ll be a believer.

The pediatric oncologist, who sees patients only after their oncologists have exhausted all other options, puts his focus on the 15 per cent of Canadian pediatric cancer cases for which there is no current cure. Each year, he directly treats four or five of those patients, but most of his time is spent with his team at the University of Calgary’s Health Research Innovation Centre, developing new treatments to cure many more patients.

The soft-spoken Narendran jokes that he likes working with children because he can relate to them, considers research fun and even goes so far as to say he would do it for free. But his motivation and unwavering dedication goes deeper and he is well aware of the life and death stakes of his work.

Five years ago, he had an encounter with a father who was told there was nothing doctors could do for his son who was diagnosed with stage four neuroblastoma, a common form of cancer in infants. That meeting was a turning point for Narendran.

“We should never tell a parent that we have nothing for them,” he says.

Soon after, he spearheaded the U of C’s membership into the elite Pediatric Oncology Experimental Therapeutics Investigation Consortium (POETIC). The group focuses on phase one clinical trials, the starting point at which cancer cells are studied and new medications are tested.

This past summer, Narendran and his colleagues announced the development of a technique that allows them to grow the cells of a rare and aggressive type of brain cancer outside the body. For the first time, the cells of atypical teratoid/rhabdoid (AT/RT) tumour, taken from fluid around the brain, can be grown in a Petri dish to be studied and tested with potential drugs.

The technique has already led to the identification of one of the key proteins that promotes the cancer’s growth and the subsequent testing of a drug that successfully kills it.

Applying the treatment to patients is still several steps away, but now within reach. The findings have been distributed internationally and researchers are using the technique to study other cancer lines and develop potential treatments.

The discovery also puts Narendran closer to fulfilling his own tall order for a cure for all pediatric cancer.

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