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Luke is a year 11 student at the Alec Reed Academy. In September 2012 Luke was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, an aggressive childhood cancer.

He had experienced back pain and a lump had appeared in his abdomen. He visited his local GP who originally thought Luke had growing pains. When he made no improvements his family took Luke back to the doctors who believed he had scoliosis. An X-Ray revealed a mass on Luke’s left adrenal gland and shadows on his spine. After this he was admitted to Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and within a week was transferred to University College Hospital, London. Further tests revealed his cancer and his family were given the devastating news that he had stage 4 neuroblastoma.

Oncologists were adamant that Luke needed immediate treatment and he began a course of chemotherapy.

Since then Luke has had four cycles of the radiotherapy through LuDO clinical trial, high dose chemotherapy and a stem cell transplant. Luke’s tumour on his adrenal gland can no longer be felt, but is still present.

The next steps for Luke are most likely to be surgery to remove what is left of the primary tumour followed by direct radiotherapy. His oncology team are also considering immunotherapy with slow infusion.

“Luke needs your help! Please support my brother and donate to help children with neuroblastoma or Luke should he need expensive trialled treatment” says Claire, Luke’s sister.

About neuroblastoma

Neuroblastoma is the most common cancer diagnosed in children under 5 years old. In most cases it is only diagnosed when it has already progressed to a late ‘high risk’ stage.  Even when children are tested clear of neuroblastoma after initial hospital treatment, a high percentage of children with high risk neuroblastoma will relapse and some children will not respond to therapy. When relapse happens there is no standard treatment path to follow, with clinical trials often becoming the best option.

 All donations are paid into NCCA UK’s general funds to further its general charitable purposes.  The funds raised by this Journey are not restricted for Luke’s use.  However, the trustees of NCCA UK have agreed to designate funds raised by this Journey to help Luke and his family pay for potential future treatment costs and all other associated costs including travel and accommodation.  If Luke no longer needs the funds, or if the trustees decide, at their absolute discretion, that the funds should be used for a different purpose, they may redesignate all or part of the funds for NCCA UK’s general charitable purposes.  We are very grateful for your charitable donation.  For further information about NCCA UK and how we spend donations, please see our FAQs http://www.ncca-uk.org/faqs

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