Letter from the President

September is Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month, a time when we wear teal, share stories, remember the women we have lost, celebrate those living with this disease, and bring much-needed attention to ovarian cancer.

The Sherie Hildreth Ovarian Cancer (SHOC) Foundation is dedicated to turning awareness into action. We support innovative ovarian cancer research with the goal of advancing our understanding of the disease, developing better treatments, and ultimately changing what ovarian cancer means for the women and families it touches.

But awareness should also make us ask two important questions:
Where are we today, and where do we still need to go?

Where We Are Today

​For much of my career as a gynecologic oncologist, I had the privilege of caring for women with ovarian cancer. I saw firsthand both the remarkable resilience of my patients and the limitations of the treatments we had to offer them.

I also watched the science change.

Over the years, our understanding of ovarian cancer has become far more sophisticated. We no longer think of ovarian cancer as simply one disease treated in essentially the same way for every patient.

​We increasingly understand it through its biology -- its molecular characteristics, genetic vulnerabilities, and the mechanisms that allow some cancers to respond to treatment while others become resistant.

That progress has mattered. 
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Today, we have therapies and treatment strategies that were not available when I began caring for women with ovarian cancer.

Yet for all that has changed, some of the most difficult questions remain:
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• Why does ovarian cancer recur in so many women?​
• Why does a treatment work extraordinarily well for one patient but not another?
• How do cancer cells eventually escape therapies that initially controlled them?
• Can we identify ovarian cancer earlier, when the opportunity for cure is greatest?​
• And, perhaps most importantly, how do we turn what we are learning in the laboratory into longer and better lives for women?

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​These are not questions with simple answers. They are the questions that require scientists willing to pursue an idea before anyone knows where it will lead.

And that is where research and organizations like the SHOC Foundation come in.​

Awareness should also make us ask two important questions: Where are we today, and where do we still need to go?

Where We Still Need to Go

Some of the happiest and most productive days of my career were spent in research laboratories, working alongside brilliant people who also happened to be some of the nicest people I have known. They worked tirelessly, and the rigor they brought to their thinking has stayed with me throughout my career.

They taught me one of the first principles of science: you don't set out to prove your hypothesis. You try to falsify it.

That way of thinking matters. Follow the evidence. Ask the difficult question. Be willing to be wrong. And then ask the next question.

I have also had the extraordinary privilege of seeing what can happen when discovery makes the journey from the laboratory to the patient.

I think of Dr. Janet Rowley, at University of Chicago who identified the t(9;22) chromosomal translocation in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) -- a discovery that helped establish that specific genetic changes could drive human cancer.

Years later, I had the opportunity to work with Dr. Brian Druker, whose work helped translate that understanding into a remarkably targeted therapy: Gleevec.

The result changed the course of CML. A disease that had once carried a devastating prognosis could, for many patients, become a disease they could live with for years.

It can be done. We need our Gleevec story in ovarian cancer.

Why SHOC Invests in Science

At SHOC, we believe meaningful advances often begin with a question, an idea, and a researcher willing to follow the science.

Our job is to give them the opportunity to follow it.

Breakthroughs in ovarian cancer research start with bold ideas, and the support to pursue them.

​In 2026, SHOC awarded $85,000 in grants to three research teams exploring how artificial intelligence can detect ovarian cancer earlier, how tumors develop resistance to treatment, and whether low-cost “Green Care” approaches can improve patients’ mental health and survival. Together, these projects reflect a commitment to advancing new ideas and bringing greater hope to women and families facing ovarian cancer.

We may not yet know what the next breakthrough will be. But we know where breakthroughs begin: with questions, with science, and with people willing to follow the evidence wherever it leads.​

This is the work of SHOC. We give researchers the opportunity to pursue the questions that could change what ovarian cancer means for the next generation of women.

We believe meaningful advances often begin with a question, an idea, and a researcher willing to follow the science.

Your Support Makes the Difference

During Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month, we invite you to do more than wear teal. Help us turn awareness into action. Help us fund the questions that could lead to the next breakthrough.

Because somewhere, right now, a researcher may be asking a question that could change everything.

Your support can help give researchers the opportunity to find the answer.
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Together, we can help turn today's unanswered questions into tomorrow's breakthroughs, and give more women the chance to live long, healthy lives.​

Dr. Tanja Pejovic
SHOC Board President