This is Sam. He is four years old. He and his big sister Lily are the lights of our lives. Just before Christmas doctors found a tumour on Sam’s brain. The tumour was removed during an eight-hour operation at Great Ormond Street Hospital and Sam has made an amazing recovery, even after a haemorrhage that left one side of his body with little strength and movement. We were devastated to discover that the tumour contained cancerous cells and Sam now needs radiotherapy to stop the cancer spreading. Conventional radiotherapy on such a young brain that is still developing will have serious long-term side effects including life-changing cognitive damage and risk of secondary tumours.

We want to try and raise enough money for Sam to have Proton Beam Therapy, a kind of targeted radiotherapy that spares more of the healthy brain tissue so has fewer side effects and is better suited to young children. It is not available in this country. The NHS currently sends some people abroad for Proton Beam Therapy but they won’t fund treatment for Sam’s type of tumour.

Doctors at Heidelberg University hospital in Germany, a very well respected medical research centre, have agreed to treat Sam. He will be receiving Proton radiotherapy five days a week for six-eight weeks under general anaesthetic. Your donations would be used to fund the treatment itself, our travel and accommodation.

Sam’s tumour was diagnosed as a Diffuse Midline Glioma (or an astrocytoma grade 4) with a specific genetic mutation H3 K27M. We’re not going to talk about “fighting” cancer, or “battling” the disease, we just want to do the best by our gentle, affectionate son with the very limited choices we have. As his Mum and Dad we want to give him the treatment that will spare more of what makes him Sam, and give him a better chance of living a normal, happy little boy’s life for however long that life might be.

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Katie and Julian, Sam’s Mum and Dad