In what is being billed as the largest private donation for cancer research in Canadian history, Princess Margaret Hospital announced a $50-million gift on Monday.

The money will support personalized medicine, a burgeoning field in which doctors use patients genetic information to diagnose disease and deliver customized treatments.

This gift literally is a game changer for cancer research, said Paul Alofs, president and CEO of Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation.

The $50-million donation, which has been pledged over 10 years, is from philanthropists Emmanuelle Gattuso and her husband, broadcast tycoon Allan Slaight. Ms. Gattuso is a breast cancer survivor who was treated at Princess Margaret in Toronto.

We believe that personalized cancer medicine will revolutionize the way that cancer patients are treated, Ms. Gattuso, 65, told a crowd of staff and journalists in the hospitals atrium.

The money will be used to hire more cancer specialists and support their research, said Benjamin Neel, the hospitals research director.

Their unprecedented $50-million donation will enable us to create a superfund to provide the necessary long-term sustainable funding to attract, support and retain the best and brightest scientists in the world, he said.

Princess Margaret Hospital is developing a model of personalized cancer medicine that focuses on earlier detection, more precise diagnosis, targeted treatment and better support for patients.

In 2009, Ms. Gattuso and Mr. Slaight donated $22-million to Princess Margaret to create a rapid diagnostic centre for breast cancer, which provides diagnoses and treatment plans in one day.

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Philanthropist gives Princess Margaret hospital $50-million to fight cancer

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