Life & Medical Expenses for Cassandra Elswick

Francesca Apollonio is organizing this fundraiser on behalf of Cassandra Elswick.

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Hello All,

On May 5th Cassandra had a very bad migraine headache after her shift as a NICU Nurse. She laid down and tried to sleep it off…when she awoke she had numbness in her left side and her vision wasn’t quite right. The family preceded to call the ambulance and the paramedic team rushed her to St. John Macomb Hospital. There, they were able to do a CT scan and immediately had her transferred by ambulance to St. John Providence.

Upon her arrival there, her medical team determined there was a brain bleed and a mass in her brain as well. The bleed worsened so they had to put a shunt in and then her airway wasn’t being protected so they had to intubate. The next morning they did another MRI and had to rush her into emergency surgery. They were able to remove most of the mass and install another shunt. The lab was unable to determine what the tissue was at that time so they sent the biopsy out to a lab. The next day she was making miraculous strides in her recovery! She was still intubated but was taking commands and even giving thumbs up! We were so elated!! She was doing so well they then decided to extubate her! She has improved day by day and has had excellent reports from her speech therapy and physical therapy…

Until…

We got the pathology back from the Mass in her brain…

It is a Malignant,Stage 4 Glioblastoma…That will probably need either more removal and or chemotherapy and Radiation. This was not the diagnoses we wanted of course…

Cassandra, at the young age of 38,just finished Nursing school last June and was immediately hired on as a full time NICU nurse. She has since financially supported her family after her father passed away in November of 2019. Her mother and Brother are both disabled, and she was the sole breadwinner for the family.

We are asking for donations for her life and medical expenses to help ease the burden for her and her family, as we are unsure if she will ever be able to work again.

This picture is her brand new French bulldog puppy, BIJOU, who she purchased the week before this happened. She loves him so much and is excited to have him as a service dog eventually…