2024 - Let this be a year for hope for Patrick

I would like to extend to everyone who has visited this page in support of Patrick my sincere thanks and very best wishes for 2024.

Your generous donations and kind words continue to give Patrick enormous encouragement, even as we are still trying to come to terms with the painful reality of his diagnosis.

Patrick is currently receiving standard treatment for his brain tumour – chemotherapy and radiation therapy – which will continue for the next 12 months. We are fortunate that Patrick is being cared for by an excellent team in Melbourne’s biomedical precinct.

After a prolonged debate over whether we should take Patrick abroad for proton therapy in favour of photon therapy (standard external beam radiation) to protect as much of his normal brain tissue as possible from damage, the decision was made to proceed at once with the latter especially given the aggressive nature of his tumour.

It is unfortunate that Australia does not yet have a proton therapy machine. A facility is currently being built in Adelaide, South Australia, however it will not be available to patients until 2025.

Frustratingly, I am very familiar with the standard treatment protocol offered to patients with brain cancer. It is not different from when Patrick’s late father was treated 20 years ago. Whilst these treatments prove effective in delaying cancer recurrence in many patients, they are not curative.

Brain cancer is a disease that has not received the investment in research it sorely needs. Efforts in this area have changed in recent years, but advances in medicine are necessarily cautious and methodical – it takes a long time for discoveries in the laboratory to translate to clinical treatment for the patient.

Patrick wants to be an advocate for accelerated change in this area, not only because he lost his father to the disease, but because he too recognises that brain cancer research to deliver more and better treatment options for patients like him requires considerable resourcing.

The devastation that brain cancer had already wreaked on our family of four sons was horrifying. To witness the suffering and death of my late husband seven years ago was eviscerating.

To learn that my beautiful eldest son is faced with the same disease is utterly unfathomable.

Of course, we hope that medical science will continue to advance enough to heal Patrick of this horrific disease, or at least allow him to live with it as a chronic disease.

Over the next 12 months, we will be scouring the world for the most cutting-edge therapies in brain tumour management, including targeted therapies. If that means we have to travel abroad to access these, resources permitting, then we will.

Patrick is young, spirited, independent, and wants to live his best life. He has hopes and dreams, like any other highly capable and ambitious young man.

I want to help him realise his aspirations by affording him the best treatment options available in the years to come.

Please continue to support us in our endeavours.

Help us make sure that 2024 is a year of hope for Patrick.

If you would like to learn more about Patrick's story, please see the update section below.