A Priceless Legacy of Medical Research

Dr. John Fraser was a busy man with an active professional life, but his dedication to medicine extended well beyond his own practice. He was authorized by the Royal College to examine candidates for certification as specialists – a time-consuming and complex task – and in the mid-1940s, he served as the third president of the Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of Canada.

In the 1950s, Dr. Fraser and his wife, Clara, created a trust to support cancer and diabetes research at the Royal Victoria Hospital and McGill’s Faculty of Medicine. After his death in 1959, these institutions benefited from the annual investment income of the Dr. John R. Fraser Memorial Trust. When Clara died in 1970, the endowment was enlarged to almost $5-million and the trust, registered as a private foundation in 1984, was renamed the Dr. John R. Fraser and Mrs. Clara M. Fraser Memorial Trust.

Income generated by the trust has now provided over two decades of reliable and much needed support for cancer and diabetes research and treatment. Over that time, thanks to careful management, the endowment has grown to $10-million. This year, the trust has allocated $2.4-million to renovate laboratory space for the new Metabolism and Cancer theme of the McGill Cancer Centre(MCC), to be named The Dr. John R. and Clara M. Fraser Laboratories, in recognition of the Frasers’ visionary support.

“We have long known that a person’s metabolic status can influence both the appearance and outcome of tumours, and recently our scientists here at the MCC have found that some of the genes that seem to be involved in cancer are also involved in controlling metabolism in people with diabetes and obesity,” says Dr. Michel Tremblay, director of the MCC, who along with his laboratory team of six graduate students and five post-doctoral fellows will be moving into the new space in fall 2008.

“We are now trying to come up with metabolic profiles that can teach us more about the key factors involved in cancer development. This gift helps immensely by enabling us to acquire some of the facilities we need for this kind of complex research,” explains Dr. Tremblay.

The legacy of the MCC - its many research breakthroughs, with many more to come – is strengthened by the remarkable foresight of people such as John and Clara Fraser and the ongoing support of their trust.