About Me

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Bakersfield, CA, United States
Hans was a busy, happy, sweet and fearless three year old when he was diagnosed with Neuroblastoma. He fought his disease like a "gladiator" for nearly 6 years. Hans was an animal lover to his core. He was 'guarded' at home by his three cats, Black, Orange and Cotton. He also had his Golden Retriever, Honey, to keep him company. Hans enjoyed swimming, biking, gardening, grilling (he had his very own grill!), horseback riding, playing video games, building Legos, and flipping between Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network and Animal Planet. Hans loved all members of his family and he was a loyal friend. He had to go through a lot of treatment in his life. But Hans powered through it. His attitude was let's get this done! His motivation was always to get back home, to his family, pets, favorite foods and pool.

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Lunch 4 Life - thanks

I wanted to extend my thanks to each of you who helped us raise app. $5,000 in Hans' honor for Lunch for Life. Here is a message I recieved from the Children's Neuroblastoma Cancer Foundation. Hans is on a NANT clinical trial at CHOP. Looks like we just might have helped fund it, thank you!

"On behalf of all of the families of Lunch for Life I want to extend an enormous thank you for your support of Lunch for Life over the last year. Your “lunches” have counted and this year we will be able to fund more incredible life saving research. Thanks to your support we hope to renew our financial commitment to the New Approaches to Neuroblastoma Therapy (NANT) Consortium. In the past, Lunch for Life funds have been used to help fund promising research and the costs of putting new patients on trial. In fact, last year, half of the patients that participated in the 7 different clinical trials offered through the NANT were only able to receive these potentially lifesaving therapies because of our lunches. In addition, we will also continue to fund research all over the country through the Children’s Neuroblastoma Cancer Foundation’s (CNCF) Junior Investigator Program. Some of the most notable 2 year research projects will be continuing at Sloan Kettering in New York, Texas Children’s Cancer Center in Houston, Ohio State University and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Although corporate giving has had a significant decline in the last few months we hope that we are able to continue our fundraising success so that we can add even more to our research portfolio. It is support from people like you that make this possible. Thank you."


As for our Hansie-bear - He had counts and a check up today. Kevin took him (I got out of clinic duty to get myself to the dentist for a checkup. Fun, huh? But, I have managed to slack on a lot of our other family appts, so I am trying to play catch up.) Maybe I'll even get a hair cut tomorrow? Hans' platelets are climbing up to 61, his HGB is hovering at about 11 and his ANC is fluctuating now a little under 2000... We think he is doing okay. Potassium is also fluctuating so we are playing with his supplement... We're going to try to take him bowling with friends tomorrow.

Thanks for checking up on us...

Love, Lara

4 comments:

suzanne said...

Hi Hans!

Are you all going to ring in the New Year? Elizabeth doesn't usually make it to midnight, but she has hopes she might do it this year. She's visiting her aunt in Dallas for a few days.

Wow, your mom has done a super job raising funds for your research group. Give her a high five for me!

Anonymous said...

Happy New Years! Lara, lanyards were handed out this last week. They were great!

Can't wait to see you all soon.

Love, G.Kathy

The Adkins Family said...

Wow, that's a huge amount of money! Wish we could contribute more, but happy to be a part of the effort! Take care and hope New Year's was great!

Vickie said...

Lara,

We've got the Buenger mojo going currently, so one off night is okay. We have the lanyards ready for sale when school opens back up on Monday. I don't think blood is in our future for another two or three weeks. We'll have clinic for sure on Thursday and probably Friday as well if we do a redo on topo/cyclo.

As for gold treats, you could probably train Honey to do anything, including not chase squirrels with enough jackpots.