Description: A fundraising initiative that supports the Cure Group 4 Medulloblastoma research consortium led by Dr. Roger J. Packer, in partnership with Children National Hospital from Washington D.C.
My relationship with cancer began a long time ago. More than twenty years back, I faced a rare and serious cancer called chondrosarcoma. It was the beginning of a complex journey, which involved ups and downs that were sometimes hard to explain, and marked at each step by a growing desire to find ways to change the course of disease.
At the start of the journey, during two months of intensive treatment in Houston, in the U.S., I witnessed many struggles — people from around the world who came to fight for their health. Many did not survive. Fortunately, my story had a different ending, and I managed to resume a normal life.
Several years after my treatment was completed, I had another experience which was infinitely harder. My oldest son, who was then 9 years old, was diagnosed with medulloblastoma , a malignant brain tumor of childhood . Although rare, medulloblastoma still affects about 10 thousand children around the world every year . And, in situations of relapse — characterizing recurrent medulloblastoma, which was the case of my son — survival is below 5%, and there simply is no standard treatment available.