$11 million gift to children’s hospital from Anne and Don Edwards is aimed at reshaping the landscape of genetics and rare disease research

Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital has received an $11 million infusion of philanthropic support that leaders are calling nothing short of transformational—an investment aimed squarely at reshaping the landscape of genetics and rare disease research.

The gift comes from Chicago investment banker Don Edwards and his wife, Anne, longtime champions of children’s health whose philanthropic footprint in the region has quietly expanded over the past decade.

With this latest gift, the couple is placing a defining bet on scientific innovation: that faster answers and more advanced treatments for children living with rare and undiagnosed conditions are within reach, if the right resources are brought to bear.

For families navigating the uncertainty of genetic disorders, time is often the most agonizing variable. Weeks stretch into months as samples are shipped to outside laboratories, waiting for analysis that will determine a diagnosis—or reveal the lack of one.

The Edwardses have long followed those stories, often meeting families whose medical journeys are measured not just in years or hospital visits but in the emotional calculus of hope against uncertainty.

Their $11 million donation directly targets that bottleneck. It will establish the Edwards Family Division of Genetics and Rare Diseases, a new institutional hub that will allow Lurie Children’s to conduct its own diagnostic testing in-house.

Hospital officials say this shift could cut wait times dramatically, shrinking months-long delays into a matter of weeks, and accelerating the timeline for care plans, therapies, and crucial clinical trial enrollment.

For Don and Anne Edwards, the decision to fund this initiative reflects both personal conviction and a broader philanthropic philosophy. Known in Chicago’s civic community for their strategic giving, the couple has consistently gravitated toward efforts that combine scientific ambition with measurable, human-centered impact.

Friends and colleagues describe them as donors who ask not just what a project will achieve, but for whom and how soon.

In supporting genetic medicine—a field advancing at unprecedented speed—they are seeking to widen the circle of children who benefit from those breakthroughs, bringing cutting-edge tools to families who, until now, have often waited in limbo.

Lurie Children’s President and CEO Tom Shanley called the Edwardses’ generosity a beacon for families nationwide, emphasizing that the impact will extend far beyond Chicago.

Rare diseases collectively affect millions of children, yet research in the field remains chronically underfunded.

The new division promises not only faster diagnostics but also a robust expansion of the hospital’s ability to train the next generation of geneticists.

With the Edwardses’ backing, Lurie plans to build the largest genetics training program in Illinois, cultivating a workforce equipped to meet the rising demand for expertise in genomic medicine.

The gift also accelerates Lurie’s push into gene therapy and clinical research, a frontier where treatment possibilities are expanding at an extraordinary pace.

Hospital officials say the funding will allow them to triple the number of active gene therapy and rare-disease trials, aiming for 75 by the end of the decade. For families navigating illnesses once considered untreatable, access to those trials can be lifesaving.

For the Edwards family, the gift is an affirmation of their belief that philanthropy can—and should—bend the arc of scientific progress toward the children who need it most.

For Lurie Children’s, it marks the beginning of an ambitious new chapter, one in which cutting-edge medicine is brought closer to home, and the wait for answers grows shorter for thousands of families who have already waited too long.

Excluding their children’s hospital gift, Don and Anne Edwards have verifiably committed at least $10 million to the University of Illinois at Urbana‑Champaign—directed to the Illinois Innovation Network and Discovery Partners Institute, Gies College of Business (including a $7 million portion for Gies initiatives and scholarships), and athletics (Ubben Basketball Complex and men’s golf)—plus an additional $100,000 to establish the UI Health Employee Relief Fund for frontline healthcare workers during COVID‑19, with earlier endowed scholarships and ongoing arts and civic giving in Chicago (notably Lyric Opera and Steppenwolf).