A chance for treatment

An ordinary visit to the optometrist complaining about how her glasses cut off her peripheral vision, lead to a diagnosis of Glioblastoma (Grade IV brain tumour) for Mum in June 2024. She then had a craniotomy followed by chemo and radiation.

This is not a well funded or well researched type of cancer, and being in New Zealand has meant that we have even less options than most. After our last scan which showed regrowth, we were advised no further surgery is available to us, and there aren't any options left for us at home.

After a lot of research, we are heading to Germany in September 2025 for dendritic cell treatment, there is a lot of information out there and this is the treatment we feel is the best move forward. There is no cure for this cancer yet, we can only do our best at keeping it at bay. Dendritic treatment aims to have your immune system identify and attack the cancer cells. The downside for this treatment is the initial upfront costs, time away from home, and then ongoing maintenance + costs. Due to the cost of this and offers of help from many, we have set this page up as a way for people to assist in this process if they wish.

We remain optimistic and Mum's only symptom is the slight vision loss. We hope to keep it that way!

We greatly appreciate your support through this time, updates to be posted on the page as we feel ready to share. As a family, we do keep things a bit private so it has taken a bit to swallow humility and ask for help in this process.