The American Childhood Cancer Organization (ACCO) stands proudly at the forefront of the fight against childhood cancer, continuing our efforts to bring comfort and support to children with cancer and their families throughout their journey.

Our library of free learning resources is growing! Thanks to our donors, this past year, we delivered more than 45,000 individual items free of charge across the US! We are especially excited about the introduction of ACCO’s Medical Play Therapy Kit-a learning tool designed to familiarize children with the medical devices used during their cancer treatments.

In the words of one parent, “My little Gabriel received his medical play kit yesterday! He loves it! What a brilliant idea to give our cancer kids back a sense of control, when there is so much they can’t control through treatment.” Another parent wrote to say, “For a patient like Liam, one of his biggest obstacles has always been overcoming the fear of his port being accessed. Thanks to your play kit Liam is finding fun and new ways of exploring the entire process of port activation. Thank you ACCO for our play kit.” We could ask for no better evidence of the importance of our organization than these powerful testimonials.

Awareness is building across the nation, and the world! The world sparkled with gold lights illuminating countless buildings during Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Our 2015 Go Gold for Kids with Cancer® t-shirt campaigns raised more awareness than we could have ever imagined, with more than 12,012 shirts, honoring the names of 4,892 children who have suffered from childhood cancer, proudly bringing awareness of childhood cancer right into the heart of your local communities. Our new website gives families even easier access to our amazing wealth of learning resources, insightful blogs, and online support community, and through social media we connect more than 78,000 individual family members, survivors, and supporters with our ever-expanding ACCO family.

Our voice is spreading! In the US, ACCO participated in the writing of the Childhood Cancer STAR Act (Survivorship, Treatment Access & Research), which brings hope to tens of thousands of children on active treatment and to the hundreds of thousands of survivors through increased government appropriations. And our efforts do not end at our borders. Cancer remains the leading non-communicable disease-related cause of death of children in the world, primarily due to lack of access to quality healthcare and effective treatment options. I was proud to have served on the planning committee of the 68th World Health Assembly’s first side-event on childhood cancer, along with board member Dr. Greg Aune as invited speaker. ACCO will continue to represent the U.S. in global childhood cancer advocacy initiatives, including the WHO’s committee working towards a 2017 childhood cancer resolution. Our goal is to reduce global childhood cancer mortality 30% by 2030.

The ACCO is growing, thanks to you! To accommodate this growth, we will be looking for a larger space to allow us to more efficiently house and ship our resources across the country. Our mission won’t end until these learning resources and support are no longer needed. Only through the generosity of individuals like you, can we continue to impact the lives of cancer’s littlest patients. Thank you for your consideration to help raise awareness about childhood cancer and to help ACCO provide national and international advocacy, support, and essential learning resources to children and their families. 

Because Kids Can’t Fight Cancer Alone®…our goal is to ensure that they don’t have to.

Ruth I Hoffman MPH, Executive Director

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