HOUSTON – September is Pediatric Cancer Awareness Month.
The money and the support pediatric cancer gets from the government is pretty limited compared to adult cancers. That’s why one former cancer patient has been raising money for a nonprofit organization that made her hospital stays better.
Dylan Probe was only nine years old when she got Ewing sarcoma, a bone cancer that required chemo, a lower limb amputation, then chemo again.
Now a teenager, Dylan has raised thousands of dollars for Sky High for Kids, which provides financial and emotional support to kids with cancer.
“As soon as I was done with treatment, I was determined to raise money for the cause. Because when I was young, I learned about the 4% rule, where 4% of government funding for cancer patients goes to pediatrics, and I mean, I was so upset when I heard that. So, I made it a goal of mine to raise money for the cause,” Probe said. “I did lemonade stands, and in the wintertime, I would do hot cocoa stands.”
“Dylan is our why,” Brittany Franklin, the founder and CEO of Sky High said. “Sky High is now global. We’re working with Texas Children’s all the way in sub-Saharan Africa and so with 400,000 children diagnosed every year, what better way than to have those survivors come back to be a part of our family and our mission and say, ‘This is why you should give to an organization like Sky High, their research dollars and their comfort programs either help me during my journey... or save my life.’”
Franklin says the organization is determined to give money, like the $40,000 Dylan raised, to helping improve the treatments for kids and create a world where patients never have to worry about what complications could come later in life.
“A lot of the long-term side effects don’t really come from the cancer itself, but from the chemotherapy and the medicines that you get to treat it. Like a lot of the chemo that I received can be hard on your heart, your kidneys, or in women it can affect your fertility,” Dylan said.
“We are investing in better treatment, which is what we’re doing at Texas Children’s Cancer Center through our immunotherapy center. We were able to fund and build the first one for pediatrics in the entire country. That’s a less toxic way for children to receive treatment and we’re hoping that one day we can get rid of chemotherapy altogether,” Franklin said.