Doing it for Laura 2023

Our daughter, Laura was diagnosed with brain cancer in Autumn 2018 when she was just 18.

She was given a prognosis of roughly 12 months and told to go away and make memories. She bravely endured a craniotomy to remove the largest tumour and then started a gruelling program of radiotherapy and chemotherapy.

But then we found an innovative new immunotherapy treatment available only in Germany and with the help of our friends, community and the wonderful people who donated through GoFundMe, we were able to take Laura out to Cologne on a regular basis and to our delight, her immune system responded to the treatment.

Laura remained well, well enough to go back to university in Manchester and amazingly, she graduated with a 2:1 degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics last summer. Fast forward 4 years and Laura's now had 4 brain surgeries, which still astonishes me, she's had 40 fractions of radiotherapy and almost 2 years of chemo.

Last November she was really poorly, the tumour removed in October had already grown back and radiotherapy didn't seem to have made much difference. We thought we were going to lose her and brought Christmas forward. However, she has bounced back and is now having a treatment called Avastin (unfortunately not available on the NHS for glioblastoma). This helps with the symptoms and reduces the swelling in the brain but it isn't a cure.

We have been recommended another treatment, once again in Germany, that uses a harmless virus injected into the tumour site. It's a bit scary because obviously that's an injection directly into her brain but we feel that this level of immunotherapy is the best option available to Laura at this stage.

We appreciate that Laura's had a great deal of support already and we're so grateful to everyone that has raised funds for her. It really has made the most incredible difference and I honestly don't think that she'd be here without it. She's used the last few years wisely, studying and working as an ambassador for The Brain Tumour Charity and helping out in the community.

We think Laura is an incredibly special girl who deserves the luxury of getting old and we will do everything we can to give her that opportunity.

Thank you so much for your support

Nicola, Mark, Laura and Gracie xxxx