Courage and Cord Blood

16 September 2010
News Release

Courage and Cord Blood - The Story Of A Little Girl's Pioneering Battle With Cancer

In 2007, aged just four, Auckland girl, Frances Everall became the first Kiwi kid to use her own umbilical cord blood to help in her battle against a potentially fatal cancer. Today the uplifting story of her family's fight for her life is being released.

Called "Saving Frances – beating cancer with courage and cord blood”, the book and short DVD tell of the family's heart wrenching struggle with the disease that nearly claimed Frances' life and the cord blood that saved it.

Aged just four, Frances was diagnosed with a Stage 4 Neuroblastoma (a cancer of the nervous system) and one of the options given by doctors at Starship was to take her home to die. If the cancer didn’t kill her the doctors said, the treatment possibly would.

Spokesperson Kristina Anderson said the family had no history of cancer and were absolutely devastated when they got the diagnosis for Frances - especially when they were told that she wasn’t expected to survive.

“But we weren’t prepared to give up, and armed with the cord blood we had banked at Frances’ birth in 2002, we set about fighting the deadly disease.

Over the next 8 months, Frances endured 6 rounds of chemo, eight hours of surgery to remove a 13 centimetre cancerous tumour and then radiotherapy.

She was extremely ill by the time the treatment finished – with no ability to fight infection or recover.”

But because Frances’ parents had banked her umbilical cord blood with CordBank when she was born, they were able to use it after the cancer treatment to rebuild her immune system with no risk of rejection.

Within a week of the simple reinfusion at Starship Children’s Hospital, Frances’ condition improved dramatically and three weeks later she left hospital.

“It’s three years ago this month that she had her reinfusion and we’re thrilled that she’s now collecting dolls and Lady Gaga songs instead of cancer beads,” said Kristina.

Umbilical cord blood contains stem cells which can only be collected at birth. Because they are an exact match to the person they are collected from, they have been used to successfully “reboot” immune systems after cancer treatment and regenerate brain tissue after injury.

Kristina says other children who were treated for Neuroblastoma and who did not have cord blood stored are not alive today.

“You never know what’s going to happen in your child’s future - having the cord blood stored saved her life.

We think of it in the same way as a fire insurance policy – you don’t want your house to burn down but if it did you’d be pleased you had planned for it.

We’re sharing our story so that other expectant parents can be made aware that banking their children’s cord blood could be a life-saving decision.”

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Copies of "Saving Frances – beating cancer with courage and cord blood" are available for $24.99 +P&P in paper back, or $11.99 as a downloaded e-book from www.cordbank.co.nz as of today. The DVD is also available to view on YouTube or at www.cordbank.co.nz.

Proceeds from the sale of the book will go to the not-for-profit NZ Cord Blood Foundation, which aims to raise awareness of the cord blood therapies and scientific advances as well as making grants to families seeking cord blood treatment.

Established in 2002, CordBank is licensed by Medsafe, the regulatory arm of the New Zealand Ministry of Health. Expectant parents need to register for their baby’s cord blood to be collected and stored with CordBank before their baby is born. More information is available at www.cordbank.co.nz or by calling 0800 267 322.

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