McNair students join classmate’s fight with cancer
Posted on Thursday, March 6, 2008
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/nwat/News/62855/
When McNair Middle School sixth-graders chose a fundraising project, they thought of their classmate Sara Caroline, 11, who has been dealing with leukemia since being diagnosed in early December.
“ I just thought it was fantastic that they did that, ” said Julianne Lewis, Sara Caroline’s mother. “ To have her get it and have her kind of removed from their circle, I know that makes it more of an at-home thing for them to deal with. ”
Sara Caroline is undergoing chemotherapy treatments and cannot return to school because of her compromised immunity.
The McNair Middle School Mavericks pod raised about $ 1, 700 in her name for the Arkansas Children’s Hospital Foundation, said Rebecca McCredy, publicity chairman for the Circle of Friends in Northwest Arkansas, a group that raises money and awareness for the Little Rock hospital.
Students presented the check to Circle of Friends last week.
To raise the money, students made piggy banks, and classmates put money in the ones they liked best. The three finalists were a pig, a model of the White House and a toilet, said Sara Maland, president of the Northwest Arkansas chapter of Circle of Friends.
The chapter, which McCredy said has at least 100 members, is one of 13 throughout the state. Last year, it raised about $ 96, 000 for the hospital foundation, she said. This year, it raised more than $ 100, 000 with a three-week calling campaign.
Including other donations, such as the one from McNair, the chapter has raised about $ 150, 000 this year, Maland said.
Money given to the hospital foundation is used for a variety of efforts, including research, equipment and program support.
“ It goes to so many different things, ” Maland said.
Among the items Circle of Friends funds is the hospital’s Pulse Center, which opened last year. It is a simulation center used to train doctors, nurses and emergency medical technicians with lifelike models of children in all age groups.
“ It trains them on emergency situations without having to be in the emergency situation, ” Maland said.
Circle of Friends money also goes toward the mobile dental clinic that serves underprivileged children throughout the state, the hospital’s Parenting in Arkansas magazine, and an outreach hotline parents can call anytime if they have questions about their child’s treatment at the hospital.
Maland said the Circle of Friends Northwest Arkansas chapter, which has been around for about five years, is working more with schools to raise funds.
“ Every year we try to pick up more and more things to do, ” she said.
In addition to the McNair donation, about $ 1, 000 was raised in early February by first-graders at Vandergriff Elementary School in Fayetteville, Maland said. The students also made Valentine’s Day cards for the cardiac unit staff at the children’s hospital.
Sara Caroline was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, commonly referred to as ALL. It is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow, which is the material inside bones where blood cells are made.
“ It’s actually one of the most common cancers that we see in kids, ” said Dr. Kimo Stine, professor of pediatrics at Arkansas Children’s Hospital.
In Arkansas, he said, “ we see about 40 new patients a year with ALL. ”
“ No one knows what causes it, ” he said.
Adults get the disease, but it behaves differently in them than it does in children.
“ It’s more treatable in kids, ” Stine said.
About 70-75 percent of children who get it will be cured with treatment, he said.
“ Certain types have a higher cure rate, ” he said.
There has been much progress in the treatment of ALL, he said, and clinical trials have been a key factor in increasing the cure rate.
The Arkansas Children’s Hospital participates in the Children’s Oncology Group, a National Cancer Institutesupported clinical trials cooperative group devoted exclusively to childhood and adolescent cancer research.
Stine said there have been more inroads with ALL than with another form of childhood leukemia, acute myelogenous leukemia.
There are effor ts to improve the cure rate for AML and decrease side and late effects of treatment for ALL, he said. Late effects are conditions that appear after treatment.
The chemotherapy treatment for ALL is determined based on the child’s age and the white blood cell count after testing bone marrow, Stine said.
If children are older than 10, they are treated more aggressively because there is a higher risk of recurrence.
High white blood cell count is another high-risk factor.
“ Not everybody will have a high white count, ” Stine said.
He said the typical treatment period for ALL is 30 months, and then patients are watched closely during the next two years. They are weaned off clinic visits after then.
Five to 10 years off therapy, the risk of recurrence is low, he said.