Vanessa’s Battle with Stage IV Metastatic Melanoma
Let's support Vanessa and her loving family as they navigate the start of her treatment journey.
Mosgiel, Otago
On Friday 8th July our wonderful friend Vanessa received a life-shattering and heart-breaking diagnosis of Stage IV Metastatic Melanoma. Extensive testing has now also identified that she has a number of cancerous tumours throughout her body including in her brain, lung and liver. 37 year old Vanessa is an incredible mum to her three year old daughter Millie and loving long time partner to Lewis.
Vanessa is now ready to undergo treatment. However, her oncologist (Dr Chris Jackson) has said that there is only one combination of immunotherapy drugs that will give her the best chance and she must receive both of these. Unfortunately one of these drugs, Ipilimumab is not publicly funded and comes at an extremely large financial cost of $120,000 for initial treatment. The other drug, Nivolumab, is publicly funded through PHARMAC.
This Give a Little Page is an opportunity for family, friends and the wider community to support Vanessa, Lewis and Millie through the extremely tough journey ahead. Lets get behind this beautiful, young family and assist them financially with any health related costs so they are able to spend quality time together without the added financial worries.
It will be a tough road ahead but let's make it as easy as we possibly can for Vanessa and her family and support Vanessa to have the best chance at beating the cancer.
Kate Gilmore's involvement (page creator)
I have set this page up on behalf of a group of close friends of Vanessa and Lewis that wish to support them to focus on Vanessa’s treatment and spending time together. If you wish to contact me directly please email me at kmbgilmore@gmail.com.
Use of funds
These funds will be used to support Vanessa, Lewis and Millie to spend precious time together through Vanessa’s immunotherapy treatment and battle with Melanoma. Donations will go towards covering the ongoing associated costs of treatment.
Latest update
Thank You and a update for you all. 30 July 2023
As the 1 year anniversary of my stage IV Melanoma diagnosis approached recently I took the time to reflect on all that I have encountered since beginning this journey and couldn't feel more grateful. The generosity shown by you all, allowed me to access the unfunded drug Ipilimumab alongside the PHARMAC funded Nivolumab. My body continues to respond well and my most recent scan showed the treatment is continuing to have a positive impact on the tumours. Going forward, I will continue maintenance treatment of Nivolumab every 3 weeks for another year.
I wish to express my sincere thanks to you all for supporting me on this journey. I feel so blessed to be here with my loving family and watching our beautiful little daughter grow up. Life is so incredibly precious.
Thank you again
Vanessa. X
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