This August, Appendix Cancer PMP Research Foundation Turns the Country Amber for Appendix Cancer Awareness Month
Union Station, Kansas City, MO Shines Amber for Appendix Cancer Awareness Month, Photo by Delightful Lunatic Photography
As states proclaim August Appendix Cancer Awareness Month, ACPMP lights landmarks amber, grows its patient registry, and funds long-overdue research
SPRINGFIELD,, PA, UNITED STATES, August 1, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- August is Appendix Cancer Awareness Month, and the Appendix Cancer PMP Research Foundation (ACPMP) is spending it the way it has every August since 2008; working to get a rare and often misdiagnosed cancer the attention it rarely receives. Each year, the foundation has even more to show for it than the prior year. This year is no exception; it is the busiest yet. A growing number of states are issuing proclamations that recognize the disease, and ACPMP is expanding a global patient registry built to give researchers data they have never had.
Appendix cancer affects approximately two to nine people per million each year. Because it is so uncommon, patients often wait a long time for a diagnosis and can struggle to find a specialist who knows the disease. The early signs, including bloating, abdominal pain, a change in bowel habits, and a growing waistline, look like far more common and less serious problems, and many patients, women in particular, are misdiagnosed for years. A 2025 study in the Annals of Internal Medicine reported a sharp rise in cases among younger Americans, with rates for adults born in the mid-1980s several times higher than for earlier generations.
The centerpiece of the month is Light Up Amber for Appendix Cancer, the foundation's landmark lighting campaign. Amber is the awareness color for appendix cancer and pseudomyxoma peritonei (PMP), and each August landmarks, businesses, and hospitals around the country light amber for patients. Last year the campaign lit 143 landmarks across 34 states and provinces and four countries. This year it returns, with more locations taking part.
“No single medical institution is going to have all of the answers for us; it truly requires a community effort, including the invaluable contributions of patients and families,” said Deborah Shelton, Executive Director of the Appendix Cancer PMP Research Foundation. “Every landmark we light and every patient or caregiver who joins the registry helps researchers understand a disease the field has largely overlooked.”
This year, governors in Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, New Jersey, South Dakota, and Wisconsin have issued official proclamations recognizing August as Appendix Cancer Awareness Month, and the list keeps growing.
The foundation is also using August to continue to expand its enrollment in the ACPMP global patient registry and natural history study. This first-ever patient-powered registry is a regulatory-grade resource, operating under full Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval with ongoing IRB oversight. The ACPMP Patient Registry collects patient and caregiver data to accelerate research and breakthroughs. It was rigorously designed with input from a diverse set of stakeholders, including researchers, physicians, patients, and caregivers, to fill critical knowledge gaps in appendix cancer and PMP.
Because appendix cancer is so rare, no single hospital sees enough patients to study it well. The data submitted to the registry by patients and caregivers is stored in a global data bank for use in appendix cancer research around the world. It is free to join and open to all patients and caregivers around the world at acpmpregistry.iamrare.org.
Since 2008, ACPMP has funded 51 research grants worth nearly $2.5 million, backing scientists working on earlier diagnosis and better treatment for appendix cancer and PMP. Nearly all of that money was raised by patients, their families, and the people they left behind.
“For a cancer this rare, research money is hard to come by, and the big cancer organizations rarely pay attention,” said Jim Carroll, Board President of ACPMP. “Everything we have funded exists because families would not let this disease go ignored. When a governor signs a proclamation, or a family gets their local landmark lit amber, that is patients doing for this disease what no one else has. In August we are asking the rest of the country to help.”
Appendix cancer has taken public figures including Audrey Hepburn, ESPN anchor Stuart Scott, and authors Sue Grafton and Carol Higgins Clark, and most people still know almost nothing about it. ACPMP works the rest of the year to change that, funding research, helping patients find specialists, and supporting families through a diagnosis few of them saw coming.
There are a few ways to take part. Share the foundation's posts and tag @appendixcancerpmp with #AmberforAppendixCancer, ask a local landmark to light amber, join the patient registry, or give to research. Patient stories, symptom information, and the full month's schedule are at acpmp.org/August.
About the Appendix Cancer PMP Research Foundation
The Appendix Cancer PMP Research Foundation (ACPMP) is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization (EIN 26-2890160) founded in 2008 by a community of people affected by appendix cancer, pseudomyxoma peritonei (PMP), and related peritoneal surface malignancies. ACPMP funds research to find better treatments and a cure, and supports education for health care professionals, patients, and families. Learn more at acpmp.org.
Dana Jackson Cohen
ACPMP
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