Vera Bradley taps mobile to empower volunteers for breast cancer fundraiser

By Chantal Tode

July 24, 2013

Vera Bradley leverages mobile for events

Handbag and accessory brand Vera Bradley tapped mobile to help empower volunteers at an annual fundraising event for the company?s breast cancer foundation.

The Vera Bradley Foundation for Breast Cancer developed a custom mobile event application to improve communications and eliminate paper waste for the organizaton?s 20th Annual Vera Bradley Golf and Tennis Tournament fundraiser. The app saw a 50 percent adoption rate among event organizers and volunteers, with the app being used 3,000 times over the course of the three-day event.

?It makes sense for Vera Bradley to leverage mobile applications for their fundraising events via the Sojourner Mobile Volunteer App because they have over 300 volunteers and sometimes more that help with their events,? said Jeanette Mojares, director of marketing at Sita Corp., Somerset, NJ.

?Their volunteers are spread out during the event,? she said. ?Everyone has a smartphone device.

?It was an easy way to collaborate the tasks, communicate information and provide last-minute changes to the schedule. It saved them on paper costs, time and enabled communication in real-time.?

The Vera Bradley Foundation raises money to fight breast cancer and manages the largest women?s amateur golf and tennis charity in the nation.

Easier communication
Vera Bradley worked with Sojourner Mobile Communications, a division of Sita Corp., to develop the mobile event app during a three-day development and deployment period.

This year?s event included a Go Green initiative, with the mobile app helping the organization reach it goals of replacing a dozen event organization binders. The app also saved 3,000 pages of paper over the course of the event.

The app?helped volunteers keep the event running smoothly?

The app made it easier for event organizers and volunteers to communicate and coordinate activities, freeing them up to focus on raising funds and awareness in the fight against breast cancer.

The customized app was used 1,400 times on the first day of the event.

Mobile events
Like many fashion and accessory brands, Vera Bradley has been building its mobile repertoire over the past couple of years.

For example, the company offers the Vera Bradley iCatalog for iPad app, providing a feature-rich way to shop its catalogs.

Last year, it also brought out a Welcome Back app for fall 2012 that featured the latest back-to-school fashions.

All types of brands are also leveraging mobile to enhance events they are organizing or sponsoring.

Online insurance firm Esurance recently made it easy for attendees at the Bite of Seattle festival to share their favorite foods for a chance to win a prize via Twitter (see story).

Additionally, surfing apparel manufacturer and retailer Rip Curl drove a 23 percent increase in app opens for its surfing events app by incorporating rich media push notifications (see story).

"More and more brands are embracing mobile for their events,? Ms. Mojares said. ?All major brands have at least one mobile app to promoting their brand.?

Final Take
Chantal Tode is associate editor on Mobile Marketer, New York

Associate Editor Chantal Tode covers advertising, messaging, legal/privacy and database/CRM. Reach her at chantal@mobilemarketer.com.

View the original article here

Landmark breast cancer study

A new study could revolutionise the way women with breast cancer will be diagnosed and treated in the future by reclassifying the disease into 10 completely new categories based on the tumour’s genetic ‘fingerprint’.

The study suggests that doctors could one day predict survival more accurately based on these new categories or subtypes, and better tailor treatment to the individual patient.

The research, published in the journal Nature is the largest global gene study of breast cancer tissue ever performed – the culmination of decades of research into the disease.

Researchers from the Breakthrough Breast Cancer Research Unit at King’s College London were part of an international collaboration that gathered, and then analysed, the DNA and RNA of 2,000 tumour samples taken from women diagnosed with breast cancer between five and ten years ago.

The scientists classified breast cancer into at least 10 subtypes grouped by common genetic features that correlate with survival – this new classification could change the way drugs are tailored to treat women with breast cancer.

The team discovered several completely new breast cancer genes that drive the disease – these are all potential targets for the development of new types of drugs. This information will be available to scientists worldwide to boost drug discovery and development. 

The study reveals the relationship between these genes and known cell signalling pathways (the messaging networks that control cell growth and division) – this could pinpoint how these gene faults cause cancer by disrupting important cell processes. 

Prof Arnie Purushotham, a co-author of the paper from King’s, said:  ‘This is a huge step forward towards personalising the diagnosis and care of individual patients. In the future we’ll be able to diagnosis exactly which type of breast cancer a woman – and occasionally a man – has, and which types of drugs will work best.’

The next stage is to discover how tumours in each subgroup behave, for example how quickly they grow or spread. More research in the laboratory and in patients is needed to confirm the most effective treatment plan for each of the 10 types of breast cancer.

For further information please contact Emma Reynolds, Press Officer at King’s College London, on 0207 848 4334 or email emma.reynolds@kcl.ac.uk.

For more information about King’s see our ‘King’s in Brief’ page.

View the original article here

Key gene in breast cancer development identified

Researchers at King’s College London have identified a gene involved in the development of breast cancer, which could lead to the earlier detection and treatment of the disease.

A new study, in collaboration with Institut d'Investigació Biomédica de Bellvitge (IDIBELL), has found that gene changes occur up to five years before the detection of breast cancer, paving the way for treatments aimed specifically at reversing changes in susceptible genes before cancer occurs.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in the UK with around 50,000 people diagnosed each year.

Published today in Carcinogenesis, the study was based on a group of 36 identical twin pairs from TwinsUK, based at King’s, the biggest adult twin registry in the UK, where one twin had developed breast cancer and the other had not. Comparing DNA samples from each twin, collected before and after the diagnosis of breast cancer, as well as samples from breast tumours and breast cancer cell lines, the research team found significant chemical changes in around 400 sites in the affected twin. Of these, scientists identified the DOK7 gene was identified as most likely to be directly involved in the development of breast cancer. On average, these chemical changes took place five years prior to the diagnosis of breast cancer.

Identical twins such as those at TwinsUK are ideal for studies of this nature as theyshare 100 per cent of their genes. Therefore, any difference between twins is attributable to environmental factors or chemical changes to their genes. These chemicalchanges in the way genes are expressed is called epigenetics.

Crucially, the DOK7 gene identified in this study can be switched on and off epigenetically, says Professor Tim Spector from the Department of Twin Research & Genetic Epidemiology at King’s, who co-authored the research paper.

Professor Spector said: ‘The identification of the DOK7 gene offers possibilities for the prediction and treatment of breast cancer and other common illnesses such as diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease and arthritis. In the future screening of epigenetic changes in key genes followed by drug treatments could be commonplace. Our twin studies are a great way of detecting these small but important differences between sisters and we hope to explore many other diseases.’

Dr Manel Esteller, Head of Epigenetics at IDIBELL, said: ‘An epigenetic alteration associated with an increased risk of breast cancer can be detected in the sick twin before theclinical diagnosis.’ The next step for researchers will be identifying the exact function of the DOK7 gene.

Dr Esteller added: ‘We believe the DOK7 gene is a regulator of tyrosine kinases, an antitumor drug target already used for the treatment of breast cancer. If DOK7 performs this function, new studies to test drugs for tumours resistant to chemotherapy could take place in the future.’

Notes to editors

Professor Tim Spector is available for interview.

Please contact Jack Stonebridge, PR Coordinator at King’s College London, on 0207 848 3238 or email jack.stonebridge@kcl.ac.uk

View the Carcinogenesis paper.

For further information on King’s visit our ‘King’s in Brief’ page.

For more information on the Epitwin project visit the website.

View the original article here

'Octopus' provides cancer breakthrough

Cancer cells

Researchers at King’s have achieved a breakthrough in understanding a biological process which causes many common cancers, including lung and breast cancer. The achievement opens up new possibilities for the development of improved cancer drugs. The findings are published in the journal Molecular and Cellular Biology.

Working with the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) Central Laser Facility (CLF) and Computational Science and Engineering Department (CSED), the team solved a puzzle that has confounded scientists for more than 30 years.

The researchers have discovered a previously unknown molecular shape which is partly responsible for transmitting the signals that instruct cells within the body when to grow and divide. It is the uncontrolled growth of cells that causes cancer to spread through the body. Until now, not enough was known about how these molecules, known as epidermal growth factor receptors (EGFRs), transmit messages in the development of cancer. This means drugs designed to stop them transmitting these cancer-inducing signals have also been limited in their effectiveness.

Professor Peter Parker, Head of the Division of Cancer Studies, is the Principal Investigator at King’s College London on the research. Dr George Santis, head of the department of Asthma Allergy and Respiratory Science at King’s, will help take this work forward.  He said: ‘Translating knowledge derived from scientific research into successful clinical therapies is exemplified by EGFR and its dysregulation in cancer. The use of new biologicals that inhibit EGFR has proved transformational in managing solid tumours, particularly lung cancer where conventional anti-cancer treatment reached a plateau. There is however still much we don't understand regarding EGFR and its role in malignancy; this breakthrough provides the foundation for novel ways to assess EGFR in cells and tissues that may lead to new insights on how to target EGFR to treat human cancers’.

Project leader Dr Marisa Martin-Fernandez, a CLF scientist based at the Research Complex at Harwell (RCaH), says: “A number of drugs aim to limit EGFRs’ role in spreading cancer but because human EGFRs haven’t been well understood, the drugs are designed simply to block every signal they transmit. But the human body is good at compensating for losses of function so it finds ways of bypassing blocked receptors to allow cancerous cells to grow again. Unfortunately the current drugs therefore all too often only provide temporary remission.

“Our breakthrough will provide a better platform of knowledge on structure variation of EGFRs in vivo. Potentially this enables the pharmaceutical industry to develop drugs that target EGFRs’ cancer-related functions more specifically but also allow the receptors to go on performing other tasks. This makes it less likely that the body will try to compensate for total loss of function.”

The team has also shown that this shape shares key features with the better understood EGFR molecules in fruit flies, providing clues on how EGFRs have changed during evolution.

Details of the breakthrough are presented in the paper ‘Human EGFR aligned on the plasma membrane adopts key features of Drosophila* EGFR asymmetry’, and are featured on the front cover of the current edition of the journal Molecular and Cellular Biology published today.

The work was carried out with funding from Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).

Notes to editors

The BBSRC award is a £5.2M ‘LoLa’ (longer and larger) grant secured jointly by STFC and King’s College London in 2009. The research summarised in this release represents just one aspect of the work being supported by this funding.

OCTOPUS (Optics Clustered to Output Unique Solutions) is a new concept in laser imaging, in which multiple light sources are linked to multiple imaging stations allowing a combination of techniques to be brought to bear on the samples under investigation. More information can be found here. http://www.clf.stfc.ac.uk/Facilities/Lasers+for+Science+Facility/Functional+Biosystems+Imaging+Group/OCTOPUS/14219.aspx

*Drosophila is the Latin name for the fruit fly. Fruit flies are often used in biology to understand more about the inner workings of cells.

King's College London

King's College London is one of the top 25 universities in the world (2010 QS international world rankings), The Sunday Times 'University of the Year 2010/11' and the fourth oldest in England. A research-led university based in the heart of London, King's has nearly 23,500 students (of whom more than 9,000 are graduate students) from nearly 140 countries, and some 6,000 employees. King's is in the second phase of a £1 billion redevelopment programme which is transforming its estate.

King's has an outstanding reputation for providing world-class teaching and cutting-edge research. In the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise for British universities, 23 departments were ranked in the top quartile of British universities; over half of our academic staff work in departments that are in the top 10 per cent in the UK in their field and can thus be classed as world leading. The College is in the top seven UK universities for research earnings and has an overall annual income of nearly £450 million.

King’s has a particularly distinguished reputation in the humanities, law, the sciences (including a wide range of health areas such as psychiatry, medicine, nursing and dentistry) and social sciences including international affairs. It has played a major role in many of the advances that have shaped modern life, such as the discovery of the structure of DNA and research that led to the development of radio, television, mobile phones and radar. It is the largest centre for the education of healthcare professionals in Europe; no university has more Medical Research Council Centres.

King’s College London and Guy’s and St Thomas’, King’s College Hospital and South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trusts are part of King’s Health Partners. King’s Health Partners Academic Health Sciences Centre (AHSC) is a pioneering global collaboration between one of the world's leading research-led universities and three of London's most successful NHS Foundation Trusts, including leading teaching hospitals and comprehensive mental health services. For more information, visit: www.kingshealthpartners.org 

View the original article here