Research funding

In 2024-2025 we've been able to award £10.1 million to research – an increase from £6 million last year – funding 31 promising new projects.

We receive more funding requests than we can support. 50 volunteers in our Patient Voice Grant Advisory Network help us choose which research to fund. This year, 24 members joined the group.

These volunteers review applications and sit on committees. They make sure people affected by blood cancer have a say in all our funding decisions. Their advice helps researchers plan better studies and ensures we fund research that matters most to people affected by blood cancer.

This year we were able to support new projects tackling every type of blood cancer from every angle. They include:

• Developing new treatments for non-Hodgkin lymphoma
• Trialling a new therapy for people with myeloma
• Managing infections to improve blood cancer survival rates.

We've partnered with organisations who share our goals to make our funding go even further.

• Cancer Tech Accelerator Programme
  Through our Cancer Research UK partnership, the Cancer Tech Accelerator Programme helps create new technologies that make it easier to find, diagnose, monitor and treat blood cancer.
  
• Three-year-fellowhip
  With the Daphne Jackson Trust, we co-funded a three-year fellowship supporting Dr Cathy Hawley's return to blood cancer research at the University of York.
  
• UK Blood Cancer Research Network
  When the National Cancer Research Institute closed in 2023, the UK lost important teamwork in cancer research. To fix this, we created the UK Blood Cancer Research Network. It decides what research is most important. It also helps scientists do work that could save lives.

Scientists we fund made important discoveries about blood cancer this year.

• Helping patients after transplants
  Some people with blood cancer need stem cell transplants. But afterwards, they can get a serious problem called Graft-Versus-Host Disease (GVHD). A team at Birmingham University learned new things about how this happens. This could help spot the problem earlier and treat it better.
  
• Protecting people with weak immune systems. The MELODY study showed that extra Covid-19 vaccines really helped people with blood cancer. A team at Imperial University found that these vaccines kept people out of hospital. This was good news for blood cancer patients who worry about getting very sick from Covid-19."

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