Kirstin Diehl was diagnosed with cancer at the age of 18. Despite her young years and her serious illness, the disease was the reason for her to dedicate her energy and courage to cancer medicine and cancer research from then on. In 1996 Kirstin founded the association "Kirstins Weg e.V.", with which she collected more than one million Marks in donations within a very short time. When she passed away from the disease on February 12, 1997, she left her heartfelt thanks to her family and all those who supported her on her way, and a request to continue where she left off. For friends and family, Kirstin Diehl will be remembered as the person who put her own concerns aside in an unprecedented way to help others.

Her parents Gerd and Gerda Diehl picked up where their daughter left off and continued the association in their daughter's memory. Over the next 25 years, they collected more than six million euros in donations for the benefit of people with cancer. Thanks to their commitment, almost all of this sum was donated to projects in cancer research and patient care. On the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the association "Kirstins Weg e.V.", the couple founded the "Kirstin Diehl Foundation". On December 3, 2012, the outstanding commitment of Gerd and Gerda Diehl, as well as that of their daughter before, was honored by the award of the Federal Cross of Merit.

In order to maintain the memory of Kirstin Diehl and to continue the life's work of Gerd and Gerda Diehl, the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) took over the trusteeship in 2021 and continues the Kirstin Diehl Foundation under the name "KiTZ Foundation in Memory of Kirstin Diehl". In this way, the Foundation can continue to realize Kirstin Diehl's wish to further improve pediatric cancer research and patient care for children suffering from cancer and to ease the fate of affected families.

If you are considering making a testamentary disposition in favor of the "KiTZ Foundation in Memory of Kirstin Diehl",  please contact the DKFZ contacts.

Please include the following beneficiary in your will:

KiTZ Foundation in memory of Kirstin Diehl
At the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ)
Im Neuenheimer Field 280
69120 Heidelberg

The KiTZ Foundation in Memory of Kirstin Diehl is exempt from inheritance and gift tax.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Diehl,

For three years now, the Kirstin Diehl Foundation has generously supported the area of pharmacological research at the KiTZ. With their help, we have been able to develop personalized, targeted treatment concepts for children with cancer who have relapsed in the laboratory. Now we are able to test the efficacy of 75 clinically available drugs simultaneously on individual patients' tumor samples, opening up new treatment opportunities for them. The drug screening program is part of the international INFORM project, which allows young cancer patients from all over Europe with a relapse to be included. It thus provides the basis for planning new clinical trials and provides decision support for new therapeutic approaches for previously incurable childhood cancers

Dear Mrs. Diehl, dear Mr. Diehl, this is precisely what you have been fighting for all these years with the Kirstin Diehl Foundation and the association Kirstins Weg e. V.: to promote cancer medicine and cancer research in order to better help people suffering from cancer. Now you have decided to transfer your foundation - your life's work - to the KiTZ. Together with Prof. Clemens Unger and Dr. Lenka Taylor, you have visited us at KiTZ on several occasions to see for yourself the progress being made in the projects you are funding. During these visits and over the three years of our collaboration, a relationship of trust has grown out of which you decided to take this step. We are deeply grateful to you for this.

We have not met Kirstin personally, but reading about her, we could probably not ask for a better patron saint for a KiTZ foundation: open-hearted, combative and selfless in her commitment to others and with a clear vision for cancer medicine and cancer research that serves the patient. We are pleased that in the future we will be able to pursue this vision together in the "KiTZ Foundation in Memory of Kirstin Diehl" and thus further improve the chances of recovery for children suffering from cancer and ease the fate of affected families.

We look forward to working together!