Who We Are

The Children's Oncology Group is a National Cancer Institute-supported clinical trials cooperative group devoted exclusively to childhood and adolescent cancer research.

Mission
To cure and prevent childhood and adolescent cancer through scientific discovery and compassionate care.

Vision
To eliminate the personal, family and societal burden of cancer in children and adolescents the Children's Oncology Group will:

• Perform clinical and research trials to define optimal treatments for children and adolescents with cancer
• Conduct laboratory research that will translate into more effective treatments with reduced short and long term side effects
• Identify the causes of childhood cancer in order to develop strategies for prevention
• Conduct research to improve the quality of life for children and adolescents with cancer and their families, including end of life care whenever necessary
• Build partnerships that will help fulfill the Children's Oncology Group's mission for children and adolescents throughout the world

Formation of COG

Children's cancer cooperative groups (CCG, POG, IRSG, NWTSG) merged to accelerate search for a cure

Over the last half of the 20th century, progress in childhood cancer diagnosis and treatment has transformed a once uniformly fatal disease into a group of malignancies that are now curable in most children. This triumph occurred through the efforts of clinical investigators, laboratory scientists and the national cooperative clinical trials groups.

With this success has come the realization that the goal of curing all children with cancer is achievable, with a heightened recognition of the need to reduce long-term treatment effects and improve quality of life.

With past successes and new hopes, the major pediatric clinical trials groups based in North America - the Children's Cancer Group (CCG), the Pediatric Oncology Group (POG), the Intergroup Rhabdomyosarcoma Study Group (IRSG) and the National Wilms' Tumor Study Group (NWTSG) - have agreed to formally combine their efforts to accelerate the search for a cure and potential prevention of cancer in children and adolescents.

A unified pediatric cancer cooperative group - COG - marks the beginning of a new era in the fight to cure and prevent childhood and adolescent cancer.

What We Do

COG develops and coordinates cancer clinical trials conducted at the 238 member institutions, which include cancer centers of all major universities and teaching hospitals throughout the U.S. and Canada, as well as sites in Europe and Australia. COG members include over 5000 cancer researchers dedicated to saving the lives of children with cancer.

All patients entering COG studies at member institutions are registered through a new web-based remote data entry system, through which patient responses to therapy are centrally collected, monitored, and analyzed. This system helps develop and manage studies more efficiently, which leads to faster scientific progress, quicker dissemination of study results, and ultimately, more young lives saved.

Member Institutions

Through the COG network of member institutions, children with cancer, regardless of where they live, get the same access to state-of-the art therapies and collective expertise of world-renowned specialists.

COG institutions are synonymous with quality.

To be a member of COG, institutions must fulfill stringent competence, commitment, and compliance criteria. All COG institutions offer comprehensive multidisciplinary childhood cancer treatment services, as required by the American Society of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology.

COG researchers are top multidisciplinary specialists in childhood and adolescent cancer.

COG individual members affiliated member institutions include prominent children's cancer specialists of many disciplines -hematologists/oncologists, surgeons, pathologists, radiation oncologists, diagnostic imaging specialists, psychologists, pharmacists, nurses, statisticians, laboratory scientists, and clinical research associates.
Click here to find a COG institution in your area.

Contact Us

Group Chair Office

4600 East West Highway, Suite 600
Bethesda, MD 20814-3457

Two central offices coordinate the collective research

COG Operations Center
P. O. Box 60012
Arcadia, CA 91066-6012
(Manages the administrative, study development, and quality assurance efforts for COG)

COG Research Data Center
104 N. Main St. #600
Gainesville, FL 32601
(Manages all patient data and statistical analyses for COG)

Questions about COG or childhood cancer research?
Please email us at coginfo@childrensoncologygroup.org