A little girl who was diagnosed with brain cancer and died just months later was initially told by doctors that her early symptoms were nothing to worry about.
Evie Poolman, from New South Wales, started complaining of migraines however doctors told her parents, Charles and Bridget, they shouldn’t be concerned.
But when she started ‘seeing double’ shortly after Christmas in 2020, Evie’s parents knew something was very wrong and took her to Sydney Children’s Hospital.
‘I’d literally just got her off the trampoline to go there,’ Bridget told 2GB’s Ben Fordham.
‘She was a perfectly healthy, active child who had just celebrated Christmas and had a wonderful time. Then they did the CT scan.’
Evie Poolman (pictured), 9, from New South Wales , initially started complaining of migraines which doctors told her parents, Charles and Bridget, it was nothing to worry about
Bridget thought they would only be in the hospital for an hour.
‘And then doctor pulled us into the room and said, ‘Unfortunately we’ve found a mass’,’ she added.
‘Literally our lives as we knew it then just completely changed, as though someone had just ripped the earth from beneath our feet.’
Doctors diagnosed Evie with diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG), a brain tumour that forms in the ‘pons’, the brain’s control centre located atop the spinal cord.
The schoolgirl bravely underwent four brain operations, several stints in intensive care and 30 rounds of radiation the condition.
The tumour eventually claimed Evie’s life.
Her parents buried her six months from the day after the tumour was found.
Evie was eventually diagnosed with diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG), a brain tumour that forms in the ‘pons’, the brain’s control centre located atop the spinal cord. Her devastated parents buried her six months to the day after her diagnosis
The devastated couple said the treatment plan Evie underwent for the condition has not changed in 60 years.
‘The reality is treatment hasn’t changed in 60 years and 25 per cent thereabouts of all the childhood deaths from cancer every year are related to this cancer,’ said Evie’s father, Charles.
‘And it’s the most underfunded of all the cancers, yet it’s the most deadly. I just find that unacceptable.’
Mr Poolman said it was ‘sickening’ that the federal government had provided just shy of a million dollars worth of funding into research the disease since 2015 – less than $5,000 for every child who has died with the condition in that period.
‘How do you tell your child that that’s what their lives are worth?’, asked Mr Poolman.
Evie’s parents, Bridget and Charles (pictured) are campaigning to raise awareness for more research into the deadly disease
DIPG cancer primarily affects children with most diagnoses occurring between six and nine years of age, ato the charity Run DIPG.
It makes up 10 to 15 per cent of all brain tumours in children, with about 20-25 new diagnoses per year in Australia.
Fewer than 10 per cent of children with the tumours are alive more than two years after their diagnosis.
Evie’s parents are now raising awareness about the condition in the hope that they can raise money to fund further research.
‘We can’t just accept that when you’re diagnosed with this you’re going to die,’ Mr Poolman said.
‘We need to create solutions and options.’
More information about DIPG and how to donate towards research into the disease can be found here.
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