In First-Person: Pediatric Brain Cancer's Giant Leap - The True Story of Real-Life Super Heroes, the Cancer Revengers

In First-Person: Pediatric Brain Cancer’s Giant Leap – The True Story of Real-Life Super Heroes, the Cancer Revengers

Shawn Mahoney
Co-Founder, Cancer Revengers;

Father of the late Layla Mahoney, who passed away at age 9 in February of 2025

Mariella Filbin, MD, PhD

Co-Director, Brain Tumor Center at Boston Children’s Hospital;

Attending Physician, Dana-Farber/Boston Children’s Blood Disorders Center;

Associate Professor of Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School

Dr. Filbin and Mr. Mahoney will discuss functional precision medicine (FPM) as they highlight Layla’s story. FPM is an innovative cancer treatment strategy that combines genomic profiling of patients together with customized drug sensitivity testing in live patient-derived tumor cells.

Given a short life expectancy after experiencing metastatic leptomeningeal disease at just month 10 of her battle in June of 2022, Layla Mahoney went on to become a world-first many times over, including in the use of AI in medicine. Most notably though, Layla was the first child with ependymoma to receive a cutting edge, live tissue drug screening (FPM), testing 200+ FDA approved therapies against her freshly resected brain tissue, to then use that data to generate a response many times over throughout 2023, 2024, and even into 2025. Many children, who would not be alive today, are, because of Layla as she has completely reshaped the cancer landscape.

Learn more about the Cancer Revengers here.

This series features clinicians and patients discussing the lived experience of people with neurological and psychiatric disorders. We hope to spark conversations on the human impact of basic science research & inspire new patient-centered research ideas.

In First-Person is organized by:
Akshay Jaggi (akshay_jaggi@hms.harvard.edu)
Jill Jones (jilljones@hms.harvard.edu)
Sophia Renauld (sophia_renauld@hms.harvard.edu)

Event Types: In First-Person