Getting Dee To Germany

Dee & Derek’s Daffodil Day fundraiser

t says a lot about Dee Woods that, whilst going through her own recently-diagnosed cancer battle, she and hubby Derek raised over €10,000 for the Irish Cancer Society on Daffodil Day this year.

And back in August, we reported on a fundraiser for Dee, who needs treatment only available in the US.

It was in October last year that Dee and Derek’s life was turned upside down, when the 44-year-old mother, acupuncturist and nurse was diagnosed with a form of head and neck cancer called Adenoid Cystic Carcinoma. Which is a rare gene mutation which affects roughly 4 in every 1 million people with this form of cancer.

And now, having started chemotherapy in January, Dee’s condition has deteriorated to the point that the US treatment is on hold and Dee needs to attend an advanced cancer clinic in Germany. “After speaking with the clinic’s team,” says Derek, “there are new forms of testing and treatment for which they believe Dee is suitable and would work alongside her current treatment.

“Unfortunately, with so many leading and progressive types of cancer treatment, individual treatment programmes are very expensive and require staying in Germany for at least three weeks, as well as longer term return visits for ongoing monitoring and management.

“Our plan is to travel to Germany in the coming weeks to carry out individual testing for Dee’s type of cancer, and from that get started on a new treatment programme as quickly as possible.”

It’s been an incredibly difficult year for the family, including the couple’s four sons. And now they need to raise €125,000 for the German clinic treatment, with a series of fundraisers now in the works.

In the meantime, there’s the GoFundMe page here. If you can spare a few euros, it will make all the difference.

Again, you can donate – and find out more about Dee’s journey – right here. And you can find out about the local fundraisers here.