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The trust was named The Elephant Trust because my husband John loved Elephants and all that they stood for. Strength, courage, protection of the family, loyalty, gentleness, and all the things that John represented.
John had HIGH-GRADE, STAGE IV ADULT NON-HODGKIN'S LYMPHOMA.He died on Christmas Day 1999 after a mammoth fight lasting two years. He had had several courses of chemotherapy and a Stem Cell Transplant at Christmas 1998 and a Bone marrow transplant at Christmas 1999, with his sister Mary generously donating her bone marrow after searching through all the family members who might have been a match she was found to be the closest. In the end with no immunity, during the process of the bone marrow transplant, he got flu in London's winter flu epidemic of 1999.
He died within about three days of catching it. The Bone Marrow transplant might have worked and it is research into that new type of treatment that we are trying to help. John wanted to try everything that he could to help find a cure, and his attitude was that if it didn't help him, then by going through the treatment the doctors would learn, and it could help someone else. With such a strong and courageous attitude I felt that I wanted to continue his powerful beginnings, and work to help further the knowledge of cancer care and support and eventual cure.
The Lymphoma and Cancer research projects that we are planning to fund are for laboratory research in forwarding the knowledge needed to fight the rejection of donated bone marrow and Stem Cell transplants and detecting very small cancer cells before they become a problem.We also help support cancer patients and their treatment.
The research we are hoping to be involved with concerns non myeloablative or mini transplantation. There is already research going on at UCH in London and there have been several successes. The treatment has only been given to patients who have already had other treatment and it has failed or the cancer has returned. Thus giving them no other method of recovery. This method has helped many patients survive for many months some even two years. It is still very early in its experimental stage.
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