Support Samantha's 2nd battle with Brain Cancer

Samantha's brain cancer was first diagnosed during her sophomore year of high school in 2015. Her vision was blacking out and she was experiencing numbness on her left side. A trip to the ophthalmologist resulted in an immediate visit to the ER for an MRI, and that's when they discovered an "orange sized" tumor on her brain.

The tumor was found to be a Pleomorphic Xanthoastrocytoma (PXA) with Anaplastic features. There are only 83 people diagnosed with this type of cancer each year, and even worse, only about 20 children. That level of rarity means there isn't as much research on it as other types of tumors.

She had brain surgery a few days after the diagnoses where they removed about 97% of the tumor. She then had Proton Beam radiation to try and kill what was left. Funny story: Samantha made me schedule her radiation appointments as early in the day as possible (4 days a week) because she wanted to make it back to school in time for Calculus class!

For the past 4 years her scans were clean. She has been in college majoring in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology with her goal being to get into Medical School. Unfortunately that changed in December of 2020 when her scan showed new tumor growth :-(

She had another brain surgery in February 2021, and this time they believe the removed the whole tumor! Since radiation obviously didn't work the first time there was no cause to try it again, and chemotherapy does generally not work for brain cancer.

Here are some photos after the second surgery earlier this year:

Much to Samantha's disappointment she had to take off the Spring semester from college. This also meant she had to give up her leadership positions in her Sorority as well as on the Equestrian Team.

The good news is that she is now part of a clinical trial that uses medicines to target the specific gene mutation found in her type of cancer. It is a long, multi-year trial that we are thrilled she got accepted to, and so far she has had no ill-effects from the medications.

She is ready to start school again in the Fall and take that next step towards medical school on her way to becoming a Doctor!

About this fundraiser: The money from this fundraiser will help supplement a number of things that were lost as a result of Samantha's cancer recurrence:

Medical bills - we have great insurance, but it is still several thousands of dollars.

Clinical Trial: The clinical trial is in NYC and requires frequent transportation to get there. The travel costs for just one month early in the trial were about $700! - and unfortunately Samantha is not allowed to drive until at least July due to the surgery and the possibility of seizures making the travel costlier.

Scholarships and extra classes: Since she had to take take off the Spring semester of college, she unfortunately lost a scholarship that she had been getting each year, and was not eligible to apply for it again for next year. Also, she will now need to take a summer course or two in order to fulfill the med school prerequisites that she would have originally taken during the semester she missed. The courses must be taken at a 4-year university and can't be done at a cheaper community college (Med school rule)

Extra year off: For those that don't know the details of the Med School application process - it is insane. Applicants need to have hundreds upon hundreds of volunteer hours prior to applying; they need to shadow doctors; they need to have hundreds of research hours; and they need to have a stellar GPA and a high score on the MCAT test. Studying for the MCAT test alone is the equivalent of 3 college courses! She will now need to take an extra year off between graduating college and applying to med school (called a 'gap year') in order to finish everything due to her last 2 semesters being overloaded because of the missed semester. Since she is not currently to drive her ability to work and volunteer this summer has been greatly hampered necessitating and extra year off before applying.

Thank you all for reading this and helping if you can. We are very optimistic as is her entire medical team. Everyone at Memorial Sloan Kettering in NYC has been phenomenal, and we can't thank them enough for everything.

Samantha was the guest on web show where she is interviewed about her cancer journey, you can view it here: