Nikita Moore

Republished from the Somerset Guardian, 15th June 2006

A family is remortgaging its house to get cancer treatment in the US for an 11-year-old girl who has been diagnosed four times with various forms of the disease.

So desperate are Nikita Moore’s parents, Tracey and Nicholas Trezise, to get help for their daughter that they are prepared to risk their home so that she can be given the controversial Issels therapy, so far unproven and unapproved for use on patients in the UK.

The Trezises, from Peasedown St John, have to raise £41,000 for the treatment and the costs of sending Nikita to the Issels Clinic in San Diego, California. They are within £15,000 of their goal.

Besides remortgaging their home, they have pleaded with the public to help, and Nikita’s school, Radstock’s Trinity Primary, is also fundraising.

Nikita was first diagnosed with cancer in 1999, after she developed a tumour on the top of her head. Mrs Trezise said: “The tumour was taken away and she had follow-up treatments. Then, two months before five years had gone by, it was found that cancer had returned to a lung. She went down with pneumonia.

“Two-thirds of a lung and a rib were removed, and she was given 12 weeks of chemotherapy in 2004 at Bristol Children’s Hospital.

“Then, in 2005, the cancer returned to the pleura, the lining of the lung. It was removed and she had five weeks of radiotherapy.”

Now cancer has been diagnosed in Nikita’s remaining lung, Mrs Tresize has looked elsewhere for treatments.

“I have been speaking to a doctor in the US who has told me they can have her there, but it is a very unusual case,” she said.

The treatment has been offered at the Issels Clinic. The theory is that cells can be given the ability to fight cancers through serum put into the blood.

“They have agreed to take Nikita and want her there as soon as possible,” said Mrs Tresize.

“We haven’t got the funds. We need £15,000. It is going to cost about £41,000.”

Mrs Tresize works as a carer and her husband is a builder, and besides remortgaging their home, they have been given help by family members. They are also holding karaoke sessions at the Old Culverhaysians club in Bath, and have asked people who want to help to contact them at 50 Frederick Avenue, Peasedown St John.

The Issels treatment is an alternative cancer therapy developed by Dr Josef Issels in the 1950s.

Cancer Research UK gives this advice: “We do not recommend alternative therapies in place of conventional medical therapy because there is little (if any) scientific or medical evidence to back up the claims made by those promoting these therapies.”

The charity recommends people contemplating alternative therapies talk to their own specialists about them.

FUNDING GOAL: Eleven-year-old Nikita Moore’s family are trying to raise £41,000 to send her to the US for cancer treatment.