Founded by former New England Patriots three-time Super Bowl-winning offensive guard Joe Andruzzi and his wife Jen in 2008, the Joe Andruzzi Foundation grew out of Joe’s own successful battle with cancer and the couple’s ongoing work with young cancer patients.
In 2007, Joe was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s Burkitt’s lymphoma, ending his football career. Joe remains cancer free today, but a new passion grew from his own cancer experience: helping other patients and their families. After witnessing first-hand, the stress cancer can cause, Joe and Jen created a foundation to help cancer patients and their families meet life’s day-to-day challenges.
The Joe Andruzzi Foundation provides financial assistance to patients and families residing in New England, helping them focus on recovery – not bills. It also funds research at Boston Children’s Hospital, building on the Andruzzis’ longstanding commitment to beat cancer. In 2003, Joe and Jen founded the C.J. Buckley Cancer Research Fund at Children’s in memory of a young friend who suffered a brain tumor. C.J.’s spirit inspired the Andruzzis’ to support the innovative work of Dr. Mark Kieran, then the Director of Pediatric Neuro-Oncology at Children’s, whose work centers on the molecular nature of pediatric brain tumors, novel therapies, and surgical alternatives, with the aim of making treatment more accessible to all.