Please help raise money for cancer treatment

Hi, my name is Tristan. 2 days before Christmas I was diagnosed with stage 4 throat cancer. I still remember the doctors coming in and straight up telling me that it was stage 4 throat cancer and the room was full of doctors. Then what they were going to do and my chances of survival and no other real options were available for me. I completely shut down and didn’t want to hear anymore, I couldn’t believe it. I’d had MRI scans twice in 2024, one in April and one in October and I’d been having scans every 3 - 6 months for the past 11 years after I had cancer in my cervical spine in 2013 and major surgery. Those scans were meant to be checked for cancers or growths. Both of those scans in April and October the radiologists completely missed an abnormality in my throat which meant that all of lastyear this thing continued to grow without me knowing until it was too late. They did have concern for a benign tumour growing on my 5th nerve on the left of my neck that showed up in the April scan and so the radiation oncologist I have seen for the past 11 years asked if we wanted to do stereotactic radiation on it. I agreed so we did. Little did I know I had much worse things going on because the radiologists completely missed what was going on in my throat even though it was there in my scans clear as day if they had bothered to check properly. I spent 3-4 months towards the end of lastyear with a sore throat and I kept seeing doctors telling them something was up and it felt like something was in my throat and it was really sore. The first g.p gave me antibiotics. That did nothing. The second g.p I saw ended up not knowing what to do thinking my MRI scans were clear as there was nothing in the report. So he stuck me on oral steroids for two weeks. That did nothing. I had my yearly head and neck clinic appointment in October, I went up there and told them at the hospital where they have all the gear to check peoples throats that I had a really sore throat and it felt like there was something in my throat and could they check it, thinking they would use an endoscope to check it out. The doctor checked my mouth with a torch and a paddle pop stick quickly and said “can’t see anything” then I mentioned how sore it had been and they brushed me off and sent me on my way. The next week I had my 6 month review from the stereotactic radiation I’d had in April where the oncologist checks the radiologists report on my recent mri scan and asks how I am feeling. I told my oncologist that I had a really really sore throat, he quickly looked at the report and scans and said he couldn’t see anything it’s all clear. I also had a review of my case at the head and neck clinic which was a week after I had been there complaining of a sore throat where the doctors all get together in a meeting and look at my case and once again my scans were not looked at properly so my throat was missed. I went back to my g.p at the end of November after expecting this thing to just clear up and it wouldn’t. My cough was getting worse and throat was really sore. He then decided to give me a referral to see an ENT doctor and put all of my previous history on there with head and neck cancer and tried to express that I should be seen urgently as I have had this sore throat for months and it seems pretty serious. I get a call early December on my birthday from the ENT clinics and they booked me in for the 26th of February 2025. I was furious, I tried telling the receptionist this can’t be right and if you look it up my symptoms mostly indicate throat cancer. Her advice was to try and send a referral to another ENT doctor I may get seen earlier and that the doctors at their practice had reviewed my referral and came to the conclusion that it wasn’t important enough so 26th of Feb was when I could be seen. I was pretty angry. Anyway I tried waiting. I got to the 8th of December and I couldn’t do it anymore, my voice had completely gone it was hoarse, I was coughing, and it had now been 4 months since my first symptom of a sore throat. I decided to go to emergency and thought someone was finally going to look down my throat, a nurse said I may have to stay in hospital over night and an ENT would look at me in the morning. Next thing I get called into a room by a doctor, he asks me a few questions, I answer. He asks me to open my mouth, checks it with a paddle pop stick and a torch, quickly says he can’t see anything then tells me I have “oral

thrush of the throat”. I then said “look I think I need someone to actually look down my throat” his reply was “ no you have oral thrush” I questioned his diagnosis again and he said “ 100% sure you have oral thrush” so I left quite lost and thinking maybe I do have oral thrush. I came home with the treatment, tried it and nothing really worked. I then look up how to get diagnosed with oral thrush of the throat and is says that a doctor has to look down your throat with an endoscope, which was not done. I had zero signs of oral thrush in my mouth. My throat was getting worse and my voice was getting harder and harder to use. I then went back to emergency a week after the first time and finally after a period of time got a doctor that took me seriously and decided to do a ct scan and get an ENT doctor to check my throat. They then found a lump in my throat and an abscess. They did a biopsy and it came back as throat cancer. 2 days before Christmas I went to a head and neck clinic and they informed me it was stage four and I would have to have my voice box completely removed and hole in my throat to breathe from. I’m 37 years old I just turned 37 in December 2024. I have 3 young children, our youngest was born on the 22nd of November just when my voice was starting to go in and out and change. My wife and I had big dreams this year and things have been completely flipped for us. Christmas Day instead of being happy everytime I’d look at my kid’s I felt lost and sad and would burst into tears worrying about what life is going to be like for them if I don’t make it. I am also very angry at the health system I have had so much trust in thinking that they were properly checking all of my scans to make sure that if something was going wrong that it would be found early and I would get treatment and be fine. It’s 11 years now since I had major surgery at 25 nearly 26. For me there are treatments overseas that do not exist in Australia yet. If it was in Australia it would be covered by Medicare and my private health. But it is not, the machine that was meant to be placed in Australia for a treatment that I could have has not yet been done yet. I am asking for funds to be used to go towards me getting treatment overseas which we would have to pay for on our own. In the meantime I am going to be having chemotherapy in Australia in the hopes that it will slow the growth down and possibly shrink it. All of the funds will go to cancer treatments for myself. I have been wanting to try some other alternative treatments that may help but they are considerably expensive here in Australia also. I am asking for help. So please if you can spare anything it will all go to a good cause. I want to be around for my kid’s futures and the future we had planned for. The time I thought I would get to be spending happy time with our newborn as a family unit has not happened, what was meant to be a happy time for us hasn’t happened. I want to see my kid’s grow up.

Thankyou, Tristan