Durbanville mother raising funds for son’s cancer treatment and recovery

A mother from Durbanville is calling on the public to assist her with raising money and organising fund-raising events to help cover her son’s expensive cancer treatment and recovery.

Niki Steenkamp says her son, Christian, 19, who is the eldest of four siblings, was diagnosed with a very rare brain cancer, Grade 4 Medulloblastoma at the Durbanville Medi Clinic on Sunday September 4.

“Christian finished school last year at Stellenberg High where he won the Principal’s Special Award at the final prize-giving. Christian’s passion has always been in the kitchen and he started this year working as part of the team catering company, Concept Foods,” Ms Steenkamp said.

Christian was brought to the emergency room at Durbanville Medi Clinic on Sunday September 4. This was after he experienced symptoms of headaches, nausea, double vision and vertigo which were worsening over the past couple of weeks in August, Ms Steenkamp adds.

“He was immediately admitted and given an MRI – they found a mass on his brain. He was then taken to ICU and put on medication to start reducing the swelling around the mass. The following day he was seen by Dr Corrie Botha, who told us that leaving these tumours would mean Chris would have been dead by the end of the year. He had a 12mm tumour and another 3mm tumour,” she says.

Christian underwent surgery to remove the tumour on Friday September 9 by neurosurgeon Dr Botha at the clinic and was diagnosed with a very rare brain cancer, Grade 4 Medulloblastoma, with metastases in the spinal cord.

“He will be treated by an oncologist and will undergo chemotherapy and radiation. Christian is now home and regaining his strength before starting treatment. Recovery from the surgery has been painful and slow,” his mom says.

She says while Christian was recovering at the hospital he was inundated by scores of visitors and well wishers.

"Christian is so grateful for all the visitors, messages, gifts and love received over the past few days. His doctor says it might be a record number of visitors to a patient in ICU.“

However, Ms Steenkamp adds that his medical aid will not cover all his medical bills and in light of this she created a fund-raising page on Wednesday September 7 on the BackaBuddy site.

“So many people have asked how they can help, so I decided to create this page. All contributions will be very welcome and will go towards alleviating the excess bills and recovery.”

When asked which parts of the cancer treatment the medical aid doesn’t cover, she said: “We only know what part of the bills will be covered once they have been submitted, but as an example, Discovery paid about R17 000 of the R96 000 surgery invoice. The funds will go towards his surgery and ongoing treatments and rehab and quality of life.”

So far they received up to R 173 307 in donations on their BackaBuddy webpage and their fund-raising goal is R 250 000.

Christian was discharged from the hospital on Tuesday September 20.

"I think the staff would have liked him to stay a few more days, but mentally he was at breaking point and needed to be home. The care at the hospital was amazing – I’d like to thank the nurses, doctors as well as the physiotherapist.

“Since he’s been home he’s been sleeping a lot and doing small walks around the house and he had his first full day of sitting up. He’s also going to start undergoing chemotherapy and radiation next week,” Ms Steenkamp says.

Ms Steenkamp adds that although their world “has turned upside down” they are extremely humbled by the support they’ve have received.

“We got support from friends, work peers, school friends, teachers, family, clients and people who have donated and sent messages that have never even met Christian.”

She adds that there are upcoming fund-raising initiatives planned but no set dates have been announced yet.

For more information or to make a donation, visit https://www.backabuddy.co.za/champion/project/christian-steenkamp or contact Niki on 079 183 5006 or email niki@inkt.co.za