My cat Hank was diagnosed on 9/20/23 with Large Cell Gastrointestinal Lymphoma. I want to help give him the best fighting chance possible, which would involve following an intensive chemotherapy program as soon as possible. If my love alone was enough then it would be covered 10x over, but financially I am just incapable of covering the cost alone.

Who is Hank?

Hank is my best friend, my little buddy, the goodest of boys. He's sweet, affectionate, intelligent, loyal, and attention-loving. For the people who watch my Twitch streams, he's been our constant companion during livestreams and games. He has also been my emotional support animal during some incredibly traumatic and difficult times in my life, including through a severe mental health crisis, my mother's stroke, my autoimmune diagnosis, the pandemic, and my brother's suicide. While I've had many pets in my life, I have never had a pet like Hank.

Like many people, I have done everything "right" but I still struggle financially. It hurts to know that the animal that has done so much to help me might lose out on the chance for additional time in his life just because I can't make the numbers line up.

Hank is unlike any cat I have ever had or met before. I know you could choose to help any of the many animals in need out there, but I am the only voice that this little furball has, so I am pleading for him specifically: please help me give him a real chance at fighting this cancer. I know it's a lot, but I also know that we can do it if we do it together.

How I will use the funds:

CHOP treatment - $10,399 (estimated)

Pre-treatment ultrasounds + cytology (2x): $1578 (estimate)

Buffer for other medical expenses not outlined in treatment plan (nausea medications, unexpected vet visits, etc): $1500

Extra to cover GFM 2.9% + .30c per transaction

For people who want more technical information about the treatment we want to pursue:

The Wisconsin-Madison CHOP-based protocol is a multi-agent chemotherapy treatment plan that would require roughly 4 oncology treatments over the course of 6 months to complete, with follow-up and testing visits in-between. The 2015 study by Collette et al. suggests that cats that respond well to treatment can go into partial or full remission, and have significantly longer survival rates than cats with partial or no response. Of the cats observed in the study that had a complete response to therapy, about 43% were still in remission for a year after treatment and 32% were in remission for 2 to 3 years after that. (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/vco.12158)

That is to say, if Hank responds well to treatment, he could live an additional 1 to 3 years with a good quality of life. He is currently 10 years old, so he could make it to between 11~13. Proportionally speaking, that's the difference between dying at 50 years old or living to 60~70 years old for a human. While it might seem short to humans, it's is not an insignificant amount of time at all!

I do have pet insurance for Hank through the ASPCA, which is supposed to partially reimburse me for vet visits. But I have been fighting for reimbursement for the initial diagnostic visits for nearly a month now with no sign of any actual progress. There is also no guarantee, despite paying for his insurance regularly, that they will approve any partial reimbursements for CHOP treatments at all, and even if they did I still can't pay the initial treatment cost up front.

Below you can find the estimate for one (1) CHOP treatment visit that I was given from the oncologist, with an itemized list of costs. I have anonymized it for my personal safety online, but you can see that it was created today and labeled for Hank:

What if Hank doesn't respond to treatment?

Practically speaking, there is no way to know how Hank will respond to treatment until we start it, but we will know fairly quickly whether he is responding to treatment or not. The bad news is that there is no way to start treatment without being able to pay for at least the first couple treatments, which cost roughly $2300 to $2500 per visit. If Hank responds well to treatment, then we would pursue it to the fullest. If he responds poorly, or has no response, then we would cease treatment and seek alternatives, or in the worst case scenario, palliative care. I will keep this page updated on every step.

If Hank does not respond to treatment, or if he passes away before treatment is finished, I will use what is left of the funds to cover his remaining bills and any outstanding debts I have for his medical care, and then donate the rest to the rescue that I first adopted him from. I will post proof for all of this.

Who am I?

My name is Sam, better known as Remescient online (just Rem to most) or S. M. Noble for my written work. I am a professional librarian, Twitch streamer, and TTRPG game dev. Due to recent financial hardships, I have no savings left to help with Hanks treatment, and I have maxed out my credit card just paying for a diagnosis.

For transparency, Samara is not my legal name yet but I hope to change it one day. So if you know me by my birth name, that is why I am using Sam. I want to use my birth name as little as possible, so I will not be sharing it here.

I'm telling you all this so that you can seek out my online history if you are worried about my identity. I have been on the internet as Rem for a very long time, and my post history on places like Twitter, Reddit, and Twitch can vouch for that. If you have any concerns about the validity of this fundraiser, please feel free to reach out to me at any of my online locations (which I will likely be posting about this on anyway).

Thank you for your time, kindness, and consideration.

Love,

Hank & Rem