A Burnham-On-Sea couple has launched a £250,000 fundraising campaign for vital overseas treatment for their son who has been diagnosed with cancer.
Young Jack Gyde, 5, has this month been diagnosed with stage 4 high-risk Neuroblastoma after initially suffering pain in January which was then investigated.
Parents Sarah Mackey and Ben Gyde say they have already started to receive a huge amount of local support since starting an online fundraising page with over £7,000 raised already.
Talking to Burnham-On-Sea.com, Sarah says they have been “overhwhelmed with local support” in the area and at Lympsham School where he is a pupil.
“Our beautiful boy Jack was a healthy, happy five-year-old, running around as normal, without a care in the world.”
“Three weeks ago he started to complain of leg pain and started to limp. We had two visits to the GP who advised that it was just a viral infection.”
“On 25th January, Jack seemed much better and he went to school as normal. When picking Jack up from school his teacher told me he had been upset that his leg hurt.”
“Jack was then up all night in pain and I took him to A&E in Weston where they did an X-ray of his hips and told me everything was fine and to just give him regular Ibuprofen. However, this did not help.”
“After another night of pain and crying, I phoned 111 and was advised to take Jack to A&E and request blood tests. That afternoon, Jack’s results came back and we were advised to take him straight to Bristol Children’s Hospital.”
“When we arrived they suspected he had a septic hip, however the ultrasound didn’t show any fluid on his hip. On the Tuesday morning they decided to do an ultrasound. We were soon called into a private room to speak to a consultant where we were told during the scan that they had found a mass sitting above Jack’s right kidney. We were told that Jack was presenting well and so it was probably nothing to worry about.”
“On 1st February Jack had an MRI scan to look at the mass more clearly and we were then told the MRI scan was much more concerning then the ultrasound images.”
“That evening we were told that Jack had cancer and we heard the word Neuroblastoma for the first time.”
Sarah says that ove the next two weeks Jack had many more tests and a Hickman line fitted ready to start treatment.
“Then on 15th February, we got called back to the hospital and were told that Jack had stage 4 high risk Neuroblastoma and has been given 40-50% chance of survival.”
“Jack is going to have a very long road ahead with intense chemotherapy and surgery to try and remove the primary tumour, with more chemotherapy, stem cell rescue, radiotherapy and then immunotherapy.”
“If things go well his NHS treatment will last about a year. Jack is at a high risk of relapse, if this happens the chance of survival is just 5%.”
“Our long-term goal is to get Jack into remission and then access treatment that is not currently available in the UK, to lower the chance of a relapse occurring.”
She adds: “We are therefore actively fundraising for the Bivalent treatment in New York, a potentially life saving vaccine. This treatment lowers the possibility of relapse and increases his chances of survival if it does return.”
“Whilst it is a vaccine, it involves multiple trips to America. We would need to pay for flights, insurance and accommodation on top of the medical bills. We also need to still get through this next year of treatment.”
“We have found many families who have raised the money and got their child to New York. Jack needs to reach remission in the UK and then travel to New York very soon after. So potentially we have just a year to raise this money.”
“I’m sure some people will think this is an impossible task. We ask that you put yourselves in our shoes and if this was your child I’m sure you would also do all you could to save their life.”
Sarah adds: “We won’t give up, whatever happens in the future we need to be able to say we did everything we possibly could.”
“If for some reason we couldn’t go to America or didn’t reach target the funds will go towards Jack’s long term care and we would help with the costs for another child who is fundraising for the same treatment.”
“Please help us raise enough money for Jack and his family to help with the costs of living, supporting the family and helping make things as comfortable as possible.”
See Jack’s fundraising page here.
