Raising money for Leukaemia treatment for Chisom

Chisom Chukwuneke is a lovely 16 year old daughter of a close friend of ours. She was diagnosed with Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia in June 2019.

She has been through a very difficult year.
She was preparing for her WAEC exams (equivalent to GCSEs in UK and a High school diploma in the USA) when she became unwell and despite that made the best result in her school. She is a bright young lady who has a very keen interest in Medicine and Biomedical Engineering.

She was admitted at Wits Donald Gordon hospital Parktown Johannesburg South Africa in July and August 2019. She has had a number of investigations including work up for bone marrow transplant. She was started on Tasigna which is a very expensive medication. She had 5 courses of Tasigna at $2,050 each.

She initially responded well to treatment but unfortunately she relapsed and was readmitted on the 4th of November 2019 in the same Wits Donald Gordon hospital South Africa till date.

Her care including medication special investigations and cost of hospitalisation are extremely capital intensive since she has no local health insurance. Additional expenses have also been incurred for air travel to and from Nigeria and accommodation for her family
who are staying close by to care for her.

Currently the mainstay for her treatment is Sprycel & Vidaza. A 7 day course of Vidaza alone cost $6,122 which is on monthly regime until bone marrow transplant is carried out.

There is ongoing aggressive search for a bone marrow donor and so far closed family members have not been a full match.
The quote we have been given for a bone marrow transplant is currently $66,000 . This excludes all sundry additional costs for the rest of her treatment.

We were able to raise more than $54,000 in August from close friends and alumni of her father. But all of it went to her care and treatment at the time including investigations, hospitalisation costs, medication and fees for her oncologists.

We urgently need to raise more funds to continue to pay for her treatment and give her a fighting chance.

Before Chisom became unwell she was an ambitious young lady. She enjoyed reading and swimming.

She lives in her very closely knit family with her father and younger sister who both have been ruled out as potential donors.

We desperately need all your help. We also want to use this opportunity to thank all those that donated generously in our previous fundraising efforts in August 2019.

Any funds remaining after all of Chisom’s treatment expenses have been paid will go to St Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee USA.

Please share this page. Life throws all sorts of challenges at us but we believe that with your prayers and generosity, Chisom will be cured.
 
The fund raised will be be transferred to my charity- Fountain of Hope foundation's account in USA  since Chisom's father- Prof. Felix Chukwuneke does not  live in USA and in effect does not have US account.  As soon as  the money is received in my foundation's account, it will be transferred to Prof. Felix Chukwuneke's account  with  United Bank of Africa(UBA) account number- 1005571450.
I also want to point out that this  go fund fund me campaign is managed by a team of  our old medical school classmates from different parts of the world viz- Dr Uju Ugochukwu(UK); Dr  Emeka Ezenwugo(South Africa); Dr Abraham Chukwu(USA) and my humble self- the organizer- Dr Benjamin Mozie(USA)