London mum urging parents to think about child organ donation as son fights for transplant
3-year old Ralph has a severe type of liver cancer and has been at the top of the UK transplant list for the past six months.
The parents of a 3-year old boy in London who was diagnosed with a rare type of liver cancer are desperately urging parents to think about child organ donation.
Katie and Graham's son needs a triple organ transplant and has been at the top of the UK transplant list for the past six months.
They've teamed up with NHS Blood and Transplant in a new national campaign to urge people to join the organ donor register.
Ralph has been advised that his best chance of beating the illness is to go to America, where the transplant pool is much larger, as there simply are not enough donors registered in the UK.
We spoke to his mum Katie, she told us it's going to cost an 'eye watering sum' to get Ralph over to the states for the vital surgery: " At the start we hadn't considered it because it would be too much money to raise that's not going to be possible."
"The amount we need is well over £1.5 million, that's just for the operation costs, and then we have all of the relocation costs, medical flights and living expenses."
"I feel like if money is the only barrier then as a parent we have to try all we can to save our son."
She went on to say: " About a year ago Ralph was a normal little boy going to nursery, playing with his friends doing all the things that other toddlers do. We didn't have much of an idea that he was ill at all."
"In December he had a fever that wouldn't go away and his tummy looked a bit swollen so the doctor sent him for an ultra sound. It was early January that devastatingly it revealed quite extensive tumours in his Liver"
"That's the absolute worst news that you can ever hear, that your child has cancer."
"Unfortunately the cancer has shown to have spread to his veins for the liver transplant to be the only option, so he needs a multi-organ transplant."
Katie and Ralph are now appealing to the public to help raise the funds they need to give Ralph a future and say whilst they are doing as much as they can as a family to raise the money, it won't be enough, nor quick enough time to make it happen.
You can find out more about Ralph's story and donate here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/ralphs-campaignlifesaving-transplant-for-cancer