What the Fund supports
The Olivia Hodson Cancer Fund is a special purpose fund within Great Ormond Street Hospital Children's Charity, established in 1997 in memory of Olivia Hodson, who died from a malignant germ cell tumour in 1996 aged two and a half.
Since then the fund has channelled over £3.5 million into paediatric cancer research and palliative care at Great Ormond Street Hospital and the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health, supporting more than 100 projects.
The Fund is focused on the work of the departments of Oncology, Haematology and Bone Marrow Transplants. Operating under GOSHCC objectives, the fund can only support clinical projects which can be demonstrated to benefit patients at GOSH.
The Fund will support
- Novel and innovative research projects, usually to establish a basis for large scale applications for funding (‘pump priming’).
- Projects supporting innovations in nursing, advanced training, palliative care and pain relief.
- Clinical research projects.
- Projects which support cooperation between scientific research and clinical implementation.
- Equipment closely related to the Fund purpose.
How much to ask for
The Fund aims to achieve a balance between smaller and larger grants, typically of up to £25,000. The Fund will look favourably on grants that can show measurable impact. Larger requests are also considered on their merits, so please ask for what the project needs.
How long for
Projects are supported for a finite period, normally no more than two years. For longer-term proposals, you must provide satisfactory ongoing funding plans before a grant can be agreed.
Things to know
- Applications from Allied Health Professionals are welcome.
- Applications must be fully costed. Research projects must be registered with GOSH/ICH R&D; projects that are not research, such as equipment or an activity like Get Active, do not need to be.
- If you have a full scientific proposal, attach it as a PDF for the reviewers. Please still answer the questions on the form in plain English - they are what the whole committee reads.
- Please keep your application as simple as possible and avoid technical terms, acronyms and jargon - the committee includes people who are not clinicians or researchers.
How applications are reviewed
Each application has two external peer reviewers: the one you suggest, and a second chosen independently by the Fund's scientific committee. You have no part in choosing the second reviewer, and they are not named to you.
If you are funded
Every funded project is asked for a short lay summary of the work and what it achieved when it ends. This is a condition of the grant, and the Fund may share the summary - for example on ohcf.org or with its supporters. We also suggest a quick update around the halfway point, though we are flexible depending on the project.
We will email you a link to a short form for each, timed from the start and end dates you give us - so if your dates change, because the project starts late or is extended, please let us know and we will update our records.