Brave Alia battles on

IMAGINE you have just turned five and you’re not well enough to enjoy your party.

Imagine you have to take a dose of chemotherapy medication every night and swallow up to 15 pills a day. That’s what’s life is like for little Alia McFarland, who lives in Forres with mum Louise and dad Paul.

Alia was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia'at the age of three in September, 2009.

"She has had a very difficult journey with this," said Louise, "although she is currently in remission and in the last few months of standard chemotherapy treatment. Her current treatment schedule consists of one kind of oral chemotherapy every night, with an additional stronger one once a week. She also has to take two kinds of antibiotic and an antifungal, because her immune system is so low.

"Alia has received a lot of blood products during her treatment, and would not be with us today if it were not for the generosity of her blood donors."

Childhood cancer is much more common than most people realise, and is on the increase. At present 10 children a day are diagnosed with some form of cancer in the UK – one in 500 youngsters under the age of 15.

"When you realise how common it is, you understand that it really could happen to any child – even a child you know and love," said Louise. "Nobody yet knows exactly what causes cancer in children, and it is often a bolt from the blue, as in our case. Alia was born normally, at term, a good weight and very healthy, with no serious health issues at all prior to her diagnosis.

"Two days after running around the Black Isle Wildlife park like a mad thing, she was hooked up to a drip in hospital in Aberdeen, preparing for a bone marrow biopsy, a lumbar puncture and surgery to place a central line into her chest.

"It’s my child today, but it could be anyone’s child tomorrow. Most children with cancer now survive and go on to live full and mostly normal lives, but without blood to let them survive the chemotherapy, most have no chance."

Readers of the ‘Gazette’ have the opportunity to help in a small way by attending a blood donor session in Forres Town Hall on Tuesday, August 2 (any time between the hours of 2.30-4pm and 5-8pm. See www.scotblood.co.uk for more information.)

"Both my husband and I have been blood donors and on the bone marrow register since many years before Alia was born," said Louise, "but many more donors are needed than are currently registered.

"Alia gets a full blood count taken every week; every fortnight she attends a clinic in Raigmore, and on the alternate weeks the Paediatric Oncology Specialist Nurse visits her at nursery and takes a blood sample. Then, once a month, while she is at clinic, she receives an intravenous chemotherapy agent.

"She gets a five-day course of steroids which start the same day, which make her very weepy and irritable," said Louise. "During that week she is pale and tends to get tired very easily. Also on the same day, she receives an infusion of immunoglobulin.

"Alia had been going into hospital a lot, mostly with chest infections, so this is used to give her a little ‘borrowed’ immunity – it is a pooled product made using antibodies taken from blood donations from many individuals, combined to make each treatment."

Alia had her most recent dose of IV chemotherapy last Wednesday, so was unable to have her party on her birthday, but is having a party with a few of her closest friends in Inverness on Saturday instead.

"Alia has about a 30% chance of having a relapse," Louise went on. "If the leukaemia does return, she will need a lot of blood to get her through the intense chemotherapy they use. She may also need a bone marrow transplant."

As well as giving blood, Louise would like members of the public to consider joining the Anthony Nolan bone marrow register.

"Alia has not had a bone marrow transplant, and hopefully will not need one, but if she were to relapse, a bone marrow transplant might well be the only option to save her life," she said.

At the start of September, Alia will have been undergoing treatment for two years, meaning that she will be close to completing her planned course of treatment.

"Relapses are most common in the first year off treatment," said Louise, "so it will be an anxious time for us."

For details on how to become a blood donor, visit www.scotblood.co.uk, call 0845 9090999 or text ‘Blood’ to 61611.